The US Federal Court system sent out a public alert on Thursday about a new scam targeted at obtaining personal data of people. According to the announcement, the scam has been reported in at least fourteen federal court districts.
The juror scam mails purport to obtain personal information from people to consider for jury duty and threaten if the targeted person does not return a form filled with the required information, they would be ordered to court.
The Administrative Office of the U.S. Courts reported that the mails were sent to people claiming they had been selected for jury duty and they provide the necessary information, including Social Security and driver’s license numbers in a pdf on the reply mail. Other information solicited includes date of birth, mother’s maiden name and cell phone number.
The scammers also claim falsely that they are affiliated with eJuror, an online registration system used by at least 80 U.S. court districts.
The Administrative Office made clear in its announcement that the eJuror program never requests personal information by direct email response. Requests to complete a qualification questionnaire for jury duty is initiated by formal written correspondence which tell parties to access a secure online connection and submit the required information.
It seems that despite it being a federal crime to impersonate a federal official, juror scams are quite common and the federal court system has a whole page dedicated to warnings about such scams. The earlier matter on the page warns about bogus phone calls on jury service that may lead to fraud.
People are especially susceptible to such scams as the threat of a fine for avoiding jury service or the fear of running afoul of the federal court system in any manner leads them to divulge confidential data that they otherwise may not have provided.