Consumer Alert: Scammers target Bills Mafia on social media
ROCHESTER, N.Y. — Here’s a warning for Bills fans as Buffalo faces the Jets Monday night. There are scammers who’ve set their sights on Bills Mafia.
Connie Mitrano is a proud Bills Mafia member with the fan gear to prove it.
“I’m a huge Bills fan. Been a fan all my life and Matt is one of my favorite players,” Mitrano said of Bills linebacker Matt Milano.
So, she sent Milano a message on his Instagram fan page.
“And I sent him a message. It was, ‘Hey, I’m a fan. Glad to see you back on the field.’ Whatever,” she said.
She didn’t expect a response. After all, Milano has 116,000 followers.
Deanna Dewberry, News10NBC: “You got an answer back?”
Connie Mitrano, almost scammed: “I did but not from that page.”
Instead, the message came from what appeared to be Milano’s Facebook page:
“Thank you so much for the great love…”
The chat is friendly, and later he invites her to chat on Viber, an app where users can make calls and send messages. He then says, “You can text me anytime” and shares a phone number with a Buffalo area code. Mitrano was suspicious.
“It is a picture of Matt Milano. But the birthday was wrong,” she said.
Then she started getting messages from other players like Josh Allen and Tyler Bass. And they had lots of questions.
“How old are you? Are you single? Where do you live,” Mitrano said, adding that they even asked if she lives alone.
“You know personal questions like that and I’m like, ‘Why are you asking me those questions,'” she said.
In an exchange with a scammer pretending to be Josh Allen, he promises to get her game tickets if she contacts his manager, adding “but it may cost you a bit.” He also urges her to talk to him on the app Telegram.
Dewberry: “Does this make you feel a bit less safe on Instagram and Facebook?”
Mitrano: “Absolutely absolutely.”
Dewberry: “What’s your message to other Facebook users after you’ve been through this experience?
Mitrano: “Just to be careful. Don’t give out any personal information that you don’t want out there.”
It appears the scammers are scouring the players’ fan pages, then using fake Bills Facebook pages to reach out to fans. Often scammers want you to talk to them on apps like Viber and Telegram because it’s also impossible to track them down.
Often scammers try to build a personal relationship before they take your cash. Don’t be fooled. Block them and report it.
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