News & Tips

Stay Alert for Imposters

Impersonators are mostly known for posing as someone else after intercepting a legal document such as a state ID or driver’s license; however, impersonators are now everywhere with the aid of the latest advancements in technology. These fraudsters come up with all sorts of crafty ways to trick people into giving up their personal information. As our Members’ Watchdog, part of our mission revolves around helping our members stay ahead of these impersonators to help prevent their personal information from being stolen.

Keep Track of Your User Credentials

First things first, usernames and passwords are among the most sought after pieces of information that these impersonators look for when trying to replicate members’ identities. They are crafty to discover enough information about you online, and figure out your user passwords. For example, impersonators would dig through social media for clues such as maiden names and dates of birth that may lead to the discovery of a member’s user login information.

For that reason, it is very important to never rely on generic passwords that contain complete words like your pet’s name. Use instead passwords that are complex with a variation of upper and lower case letters, numbers, and special characters.

Beware of Unsolicited Calls, Emails and Texts

Always remember, Space Coast Credit Union will never request personal information from a member through an outbound phone call, email or text message. When a member initiates an inbound phone call, SCCU will ask the member to confirm their identity. Impersonators commonly use email, text messages and outbound phone calls or voice mails to pose as employees from credible businesses, and make request for member’s personal information such as card numbers, CVV codes, PINs, passwords, account numbers, last transaction, mortgage payment amount, social security number, etc.

We advise our members to never respond to requests from a suspicious source; it’s always best to contact us directly at our local number and confirm that is us. At SCCU we contact our members immediately upon detecting any signs of suspicious activity, so it’s valuable to provide us your mobile number. However, SCCU’s fraud monitoring representatives will not request personal account or card information. We will only ask the member to verify and approve the questionable transaction. If you’re asked to provide any other information, hang up and call us at our local number.

We also recommend members sign up for SCCU’s Mobile and Online Banking e-alerts to monitor their accounts as well.

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