A number of North Dakotans received scam calls or texts over the weekend saying they owed money on overdue parking or traffic tickets, and they would have to pay immediately to prevent their driver's licenses from being suspended.
The head of the driver’s license division for the North Dakota Department of Transportation said a number of drivers reported receiving those calls and texts, and some actually paid. Brad Schaffer said he received one of those texts. And he said DOT doesn’t send out those texts, or make those phone calls.
"Not only is the scammer trying to steal your money, but if you also click on the link, they can get your personal information, like your driver's license number, and then even steal your identity," Schaffer said. "That's why it's important to understand that DOT would never send a text message to anybody, requesting that you pay fees, or that you have things that need to be addressed."
Schaffer said all official communication will come by mail.
Schaffer said the texts said they were from the North Dakota Department of Motor Vehicles, or DMV. But North Dakota doesn’t have a separate DMV.
"That's correct — we don't," Schaffer said. "But a lot of people just think of us as the DMV anyway. That's kind of a universal term across the country. We could see that a lot of people would get that easily confused. But that's what the scammers are hoping would happen, and it did happen for some people."
Schaffer said the Highway Patrol and local law enforcement took to social media to tell people this was a scam.
