One day Wendy Mueller picked up the phone and heard her daughter's voice begging for help. Then suddenly, there was a man's voice. The man said he was holding her daughter hostage, then warned Wendy not to hang up, and that the only way to get her daughter back was by paying him $10,000.
“They told me that they were actually targeting someone else, someone they would be able to get a lot of money for. But they said my daughter intervened when they tried to grab him. And that sounded exactly like something she would do,” Wendy said. “I was terrified. They told me they wouldn’t hesitate to kill her.”
When the man asked how much money she could give, she told him she had the $10,000. What mother would put a price on her daughter's life? The man tracked Wendy's GPS from her phone, and for the next five hours he instructed her to wire small amounts of money through various Western Unions.
Then Wendy got a text from her daughter. She was fine and at college. The entire thing was a scam.
The FBI is now warning about these "digital kidnappings." Scammers target families in rich neighborhoods to extort money from them, when really, nothing is at stake.
The FBI recommends limiting your personal information online. If someone calls claiming they have a hostage, then ask for proof by asking a question only the hostage would be able to answer. Lastly, always alert the authorities, even when they say not to.
While Wendy may never get her money back, her daughter is safe and sound, and she is using her story to protect others.
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