UPenn Student-Athletes and Families Targeted in Phone Scam

Penn student-athletes and their families have been the target of a recent phone scam. The Division of Public Safety issued an alert earlier this week to warn them of a caller attempting to extort money from the families of student-athletes.

According to The Daily Pennsylvanian, the scam, “involves a male caller identifying himself as a part of law enforcement and informing the family member that their student-athlete has been arrested for being publicly intoxicated or inflicting property damage. The caller then requests the family pay bail or send monetary compensation for property damage.”

The caller has asked for the money to be sent via digital payment apps like Venmo or Cash App. Affected families and student-athletes are encouraged to contact their financial institutions if they have fallen victim to the scam. 

The Division of Public Safety also said that the caller ID may display the department’s own phone number or the local emergency number. The Vice President for the Division of Public Safety, Kathleen Shields Anderson, urged families receiving these calls to hang up and immediately call the department, re-dialing the number, not simply calling back from their call history. Anderson said, “No member of Penn Public Safety will ever contact you to request bail money or money for damages.​​”

The current phone scams incident is not the first to target student-athletes, whose names and identities are much more easily discovered than that of the standard college student. Last spring, a similar phone scam occurred at Connecticut State University.

At that time, NBC Connecticut reported that the calls would tell families that their, “student-athlete has been given citations for open container, curfew violation or trespassing.” It is not clear if a suspect was ever charged in relation to those scam calls.

The investigation into the identity of the caller at Penn is ongoing.