OTTAWA: A scammer swindled a Burnaby, B.C. woman out of $8,000 with a very strange request this week. She got a call from a man claiming to be with the Canada Revenue Agency, and he told her she’d be put in jail if she didn’t pay $8,000 in iTunes gift cards, Burnaby Now reported.
She bought 16 cards, each for $500, and gave the caller the activation codes over the phone.
The call came from a 613 Ottawa area code, RCMP said.
“It’s sad to say that people are taking advantage of other people’s goodwill,” RCMP Staff Sgt. Maj. John Buis told Burnaby Now.
Earlier in April, a Calgary woman was duped out of $20,000 in a similar scam involving iTunes gift cards the CBC reported.
And in Saskatchewan, more than 200 people complained to Battlefords RCMP that they were receiving phone calls from fake CRA representatives.
In Ontario, York Regional Police warned residents about the same scam.
Cops never arrest people over unpaid taxes and missing immigration forms, the force said on Twitter Wednesday. If a caller threatens arrest or says a family member will be held in jail until money is paid, it’s definitely a scam, they said. They also warn that the CRA doesn’t ask for payment in the form of gift cards or pre-paid credit cards.
