(Estherville) Northwest Bank has teamed up with other institutions to educate the public about fraud. Marcy Sander, who is the President of the Estherville Branch of Northwest Bank, says this is an important seminar…
“We’re collaborating with all of the Estherville area financial institutions. So Bank plus citizens, Community Credit Union Employees, Credit Union, Northstar Bank and Northwest Bank, as well as Iowa Lakes Community College and the Estherville Police Department. So we’re really excited to get everyone’s input and views on fraud in our area to help alert the community on what they need to be looking for, because the games are getting more intelligent and complicated every day. So we need to educate the community so they can be aware of everything that’s going on.”
Sander says there are multiple ways you can be the victim of a scam…
“They can be through phone calls, text messages, emails, fake websites, social media. So basically, if you use a phone, a computer, email, social media, online banking, there are people trying to commit fraud or scams against you and we’re seeing it for all different ages. So, you know, people normally think, oh, it’s, it’s seniors, it’s um, older people. But no, there are new scams that we’re seeing that are targeted towards high school and college kids.”
Sander says scams make it hard to trust people like we used to…
“The scammers are pretending to be your bank, government agencies, utility companies, family members. You know, all different kinds of people. And you know, when we’re we’re from Northwest Iowa, we believe people, we trust people. And you really can’t do that anymore. You have to be suspicious of every single phone call and every single text because you just don’t know who is actually on the other side of that.”
If you think you are a victim of a scam don’t wait to alert the proper authorities because the longer you wait, the harder it is to possibly stop it from going any further. The Fraud Awareness & Prevention Seminar will be held on Wednesday April 1st from 5:00 pm to 7:00 pm. It will be held at the Janice K. Lund Performing Arts Center on the Iowa Lakes Campus in Estherville. This seminar is free and open to the public.
