Spread awareness of student football ticket scams

ITS Information Assurance recently has seen an increase in the sophistication of student football ticket scams. Please be aware of these ongoing scams and share this information with your student population, student advisors, and faculty.

Description

Scammers use GroupMe or other social media to offer U-M football tickets for sale. Then the scammers follow up by sending forged emails that appear to come from real students’ @umich.edu email addresses. The emails:

• Claim to prove the legitimacy of the ticket sellers.
• Will often include an image of a stolen MCard to impersonate actual U-M students.
• Ask the recipients to send payment through CashApp, Venmo, or other non-refundable methods.
• Promise to transfer the tickets once payment is made.

How to avoid the scam

Students should:

• Be suspicious of offers for football tickets. The best way to avoid these scams, according to police, is to buy your game day football tickets through authorized sources and to never send money for tickets over Venmo, CashApp, or any other untraceable source.
• If contacted directly via email, pay attention to the reply-to address. If the reply-to is a different email address, send a new, separate email to the seller’s @umich.edu email address to verify their identity.
• Be especially cautious with interactions with newly joined members of a group.
• Do not sell tickets to or purchase tickets from someone you do not know. Only do business with individuals whose credibility you can personally substantiate.
• Do not send an image of your MCard to prove your affiliation to a would-be ticket-seller or ticket-buyer.
• Refer to How to Spot a Spoof for tips on recognizing clues that indicate an email might be spoofed or forged.

If you fall for the scam

• Students who have fallen victim to one of these scams, which resulted in loss of money, should contact the University of Michigan Police Department at 734-763-1131 or text 377911.
• If you become aware that you have been a victim of an impersonation scam, inform your colleagues, friends, and any relevant contacts, that such communications are fraudulent.
• To report fraudulent Groupme postings or fraud on other social media platforms, follow the specific platform’s guidelines for reporting impersonation.
• Forward any email communication with the scammer to [email protected].

If you need to respond to a victim who fell for an impersonation of you, stay calm and refer to this description of the scam to help them understand.