Scammers target Catholic Church

Scammers are showing no mercy as they have targeted the Roman Catholic Church and commercial entities by sending fictitious emails, disguising themselves as investigators from the Jamaica Constabulary Force (JCF) who are probing them for illegal transactions.

THE STAR understands that the Fraud Squad has since commenced an investigation, as they have received reports from a pastry organisation of the fraudulent attempts being made to manipulate this entity.

THE STAR got a copy of the letter received by the targeted companies baring a fake JCF letter head, suggesting they open a 'Complaint Notice' link, which was affixed.

It reads, "We have received a customer complaint against you on the 6th June, 2016. Please follow the procedure included below in your Complaint Notice to respond. At exactly 10 a.m. today, we received a complaint that you were involved in an illegal transaction. We have immediately commenced investigation of the said case and will come for an arrest once we are able to get an evidence."

hacking software

When THE STAR contacted the Fraud Squad, an investigator told our news team that they were aware of the scam.

"Our advice is not to open the email. If a complaint was made, a phone call would be the medium and not email. There are procedures on how we would contact a suspect. Just today, we got a report from a company in New Kingston. It appears to be some sort of computer hacking software. They are trying to seek some form of info," the investigator said.

The investigator also told our news team that for entities that do online banking, the perpetrators could be seeking to tamper with transactions or carry out their own form of transaction using the companies' credit information.

When our news team contacted the Catholic Church, communications officer for the Diocese of Mandeville, Theresa Givans, told our news team that it was the first time they had received such an email.

In her case, they did not report it to the police but simply alerted the media to verify with the police.