KENNER, La. — A scam that hit across Southeast Louisiana was just broken up, it involved a fake website based in Russia, and the Kenner Police Department helped take it down.
The text message in question looks pretty legit right, well it was the complete opposite Kenner Police say, utterly fake.
Detective Brad Ricke with Kenner Police Department's Criminal Investigations Division said, "Basically they said that you had traveled down a Louisiana toll road and you needed to go to this website to pay your toll."
The detective said, "It used the same DOTD GeauxPass images and logos to make it look like it was indeed true." He said one of the first indicators it was a scam, was the link said .info instead of .com
"We found there was web traffic going to Russia and that's where the scam likely originated," he said.
Kenner Police Chief Keith Conley said, "This threat had gone across the state... It's gone from north to south to east to west."
With the help of state and federal agencies, he was able to get a state Judge to issue an order, allowing Kenner PD to seize the site. Detective Ricke said, "It's no longer scamming citizens of their personal information, of their names, phone numbers, address, credit card numbers."
The text claims you have an unpaid toll fee of $3.75. Then directs people to a phony site and threatens a $30 fine if you don't pay.
If you travel across a toll road, your toll invoice will be posted to you, or the toll will be automatically deducted from your GeauxPass account. GeauxPass will never ask for personal information via text.
Dwight Manass lives in Gretna, he too got the text, and he said, "Kind of concerned about how they were able to contact me and get my information. I don't have a GeauxPass account."
He went on to say, "I looked up GeauxPass and called them and they confirmed it was a scam."
Chief Conley says he's never seen anything like this before, saying, "I think it's pretty unprecedented." Kenner PD managed to stop a foreign scam. Chief Conley says it's a big win for his team. "I'm proud we stood up to it and did what we had to do to protect the citizens of Kenner but throughout the whole state."
Kenner Police say they're unsure at this stage how many people fell for this scam.
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