From Citizen,
I received a text message from ****@cn.com saying, “BANK OF THE WEST : Your request to close your account will be processed in 24 hours. in case this was not you, kindly REVALIDATE HERE- clickverc.us”
First, I was very concerned about my bank account being cancelled, then I realized I did not bank with Bank of the West. I was concerned that someone else opened an account in my name, so I reviewed the text closely. I saw some grammatical errors, spaces in “WEST : Your…” “in” is not capitalized to start the sentence. The email address also looked odd to me.
I started to believe this was a scam but still needed to check on this bank account. I DID NOT CLICK THE LINK, I called Bank of the West, I found their number from the computer. I told them what I received, they told me that they DO NOT send text messages about cancelations, and this was a scam. The bank went further and checked to see if there was an account under my name and phone number. After they confirmed that there was not an account with them under my name I know 100% that this was a scam! I’m so glad I took the time and DID NOT click the link. Who knows what the link would have done!