The caller ID says Yonkers Police, the voice says there is a warrant, and the fine has to be paid today. Hang up. Yonkers police call that the best response to any call like it. This guide covers the versions where hanging up is not enough on its own: the fraud “investigator” who sends a courier, the grandchild in trouble, and the friendly stranger whose photos belong to someone else.
What the FTC’s numbers say about New York
The Federal Trade Commission’s Consumer Sentinel Network Data Book 2024, published in March 2025, is the most recent edition with a page for every state. New Yorkers filed 278,662 fraud and other reports in 2024. Imposter scams made up 11 percent of them, the third-largest category after complaints about credit bureaus (25 percent) and identity theft (17 percent). Reported fraud losses in the state came to $534.0 million, with a median loss of $429. New York ranked 13th among the states for reports per 100,000 residents.
The true count is higher. The FTC’s New York page excludes the reports supplied by the New York Attorney General’s office, which sent 17,794 of them to Sentinel that year. It also counts only the people who reported at all.
The FTC’s national figures for 2025, released in June 2026, show which way this is heading. People reported losing $3.5 billion to imposter scams, and nearly one in three fraud reports was about an imposter. About $920 million went to government impersonators, up from $789 million in 2024. Business impersonators took nearly $1 billion, up from $866 million, and fake bank staff were the costliest of those.
The four disguises
The officer or official with a deadline
In a January 2026 release, Yonkers police said detectives had recently given scam-prevention talks to about 100 seniors at the Bernice Spreckman Center and 60 more at the Chema Center. The warning signs they stressed were urgent demands for payment, requests for personal information, and pressure to pay with gift cards or wire transfers. Back in 2021 the department warned that scammers were spoofing its own numbers, including headquarters at (914) 377-7900, so a familiar number on the screen proves nothing. The department’s rule is that neither it nor any government entity will ever call to demand payment or make threats.
The fraud “investigator” who sends a courier
In August 2026 the New York Attorney General warned about gold bar scams. They usually begin with a pop-up on a computer claiming the accounts are compromised. A caller posing as a law enforcement officer or government investigator then persuades the victim to withdraw savings, buy gold and hand it to a courier for safekeeping. The NYPD has investigated more than 100 of these cases over two years, with losses above $100 million. Victims are told not to discuss any of it with bank staff or family, and that instruction alone should end the call.
The grandchild in trouble
The family emergency call has picked up a new tool. The FBI’s 2025 Internet Crime Report says victims lost more than $5 million to “distress” scams in which a cloned voice mimicked a loved one. A family code word agreed in person helps. So does hanging up and calling the grandchild, or a parent, on the number already in your phone.
The friendly stranger online
This one is slow. The Attorney General’s February 2026 alert on “pig butchering” lays out the pattern: contact through social media, a text or an ad, a slow build of trust, a move to WhatsApp or WeChat, then an investment that shows growing balances until the money cannot be withdrawn. The profile photos are often the weakest part of the story, because they were taken from somebody else.
Checking whose face is in the photos
Among the Attorney General’s tips for that last kind is one most people skip: search the web to see whether the person’s image, name or details appear elsewhere, and whether they belong to someone else.
A reverse image search such as Google Lens or TinEye finds copies of the same picture. A face search looks for the same face across different pictures, which matters when a scammer uses several photos of one stolen identity. Save the clearest photo from the profile, crop it so only one face shows, and run it through a face search such as FaceSearch. It compares the face with images on public web pages and lists each page where it turns up. Its guide to the signs of a fake profile also covers what to look for in the photo set and the conversation, such as a thin photo history and a video call that is always about to happen.
Read the results slowly. The same face under a different name, or on a model’s portfolio or a stock photo site, is your answer: stop contact and send nothing. An empty result proves less than people assume. The person’s photos may not be on the public web at all, and no face search can see inside private accounts or messaging apps. A live video call is the better test, though the Attorney General warns that video can be faked too.
Five questions before any money moves
- Did they contact you first? Treat any unexpected call, text, pop-up or message as unverified, whatever the caller ID shows.
- Have they asked you to keep it from your bank or family? The FBI and the Attorney General both name that request as a mark of a scam.
- Is the payment a gift card, a wire, cryptocurrency, or cash or gold handed to a courier? Stop there.
- Can you reach them on a number you looked up yourself? Call your bank on the number printed on your statement, or the agency through its official website.
- Have you told someone you trust? Kelly Chiarella, director of the Yonkers Office for the Aging, put it this way in January: “communication is a one-way street. If it’s coming to you, don’t trust it.”
Where to report in Yonkers and New York
- Yonkers Police Department: (914) 377-7900, if you think you were targeted or lost money.
- New York Attorney General: file a consumer complaint at ag.ny.gov or call the OAG Help Line at 1-800-771-7755.
- Federal Trade Commission: ReportFraud.ftc.gov. Reports go into Sentinel, the database law enforcement agencies search.
- Your bank or card company: call right away if money has left an account, using the number on your statement.
- If you live in the five boroughs, the Attorney General’s office also points gold bar scam victims to their local NYPD precinct.
Before you call anyone, save the texts, the call log and screenshots of any profile. The Attorney General asks victims to keep every message so it can be handed to law enforcement.