State Department of Financial, Professional Regulation warns about banking survey scam

The Illinois Department of Financial and Professional Regulation is warning of a survey scam impersonating involvement from a department official.

Targets receive a text that appears to be from Capital One that says they must complete a banking survey to receive a $50 reward. 

Upon closing the survey, the target receives a message claiming to be from a department official who “thanks” them for completing the survey and lists a department phone number. 

The department warns that this is not from IDFPR. It is part of a phishing scam in which scammers are posing as a reputable company to steal a person’s identity or money. 

The department will never offer a reward for completing a survey or providing additional information.

To avoid falling victim to phishing scams, the department advises everyone to do the following: 

Double-check the message you receive. There may be misspellings or other mistakes in the content of the message.

Look up the contact information of the company and contact them directly to verify the authenticity of the message.

Do not click links or download attachments that may be included in the message. That could lead to malware infecting your device.

Those who have been the victim of identity theft or believe their personal or financial information may have been compromised can call the toll-free Identity Theft Hotline through the Illinois attorney general’s office at 1-866-999-5630 or 1-877-844-5461 (TTY).