Report fraud and stop the calls

A scam call is not the end of it. There are four official things you can do next, two in each country, and they are all free.

This page is the companion to our report on the CBC Marketplace bank scam investigation: The Bank Scam Starts With Your Data.

Two rules first, because they matter more than any form.

Protect a parent before the call comes

Most scam calls fail against a household that has rehearsed. Fifteen minutes of setup, done once, does more than any single warning.

1. Agree a family code word. Pick a word or phrase only your family knows, and never post it anywhere. Any caller claiming to be family in trouble gets asked for the word. No word, hang up. Voices can be copied now from seconds of audio. A secret word cannot.
2. Set the callback rule. Any call asking for money or account action ends the same way: hang up, then call the number on the back of the bank card, or the number saved in the phone for that family member. Never the number the caller gives, and never the number shown on a pop-up.
3. Set the remote access rule. Nobody outside the family gets into the computer, ever, for any reason given on a call. Real tech support starts with you, at a store or on a number you looked up yourself.
4. Silence unknown callers. Set the phone so numbers that are not in contacts go straight to voicemail. Most scam calls die there, and a real caller leaves a message.
5. Put a password on the voicemail. Some voicemail systems open to anyone calling from your own number, and numbers can be faked. A PIN closes that door.
6. Tighten the social profiles. Set accounts to private and remove public posts that hand a researcher the family tree: full names of relatives, birthdays, the school, the team, the vacation dates.
7. Shrink the listing. Run the free scan to see whether their email has been in a breach, and remove their name, address, and phone number from the people-search sites that publish them next to their relatives. That listing is the research file the convincing call is built from.
8. Say the no-shame line out loud. If a call ever works, the family hears about it the same day, with no blame attached. Shame is what keeps a loss secret until it becomes a second and third loss.

The free academy walks through the call itself, act by act: Anatomy of a scam call.

Canada

United States

What these cannot do

Reporting helps investigators. Reports link cases together, show crime trends, and support prosecutions. A report does not get your money back by itself. The FTC says the same about its own system: it cannot resolve individual reports. Money sent by wire, gift cards, or crypto is extremely difficult, and often impossible, to trace and recover, so the protection has to happen before the send.

The Do Not Call lists bind legitimate telemarketers. Criminal scammers ignore them, because ignoring the law is the business model. Registering cuts the background noise, which makes a fake bank call easier to recognize for what it is. It lowers your exposure. It does not make you safe.

Then shrink what is out there

The scam call sounds real because the caller already has your name, your number, and your bank. That information circulates through breaches and data broker listings. Two steps cut it down.

Check whether your email has been in a breach, free: run the free scan.

Then remove the listings themselves. Ghost Delete removes your personal information from 30 to 50 Tier 1 data brokers in the United States and Canada, and every confirmed removal is backed by proof captured by the platform. Removal does not stop spoofed calls and does not protect a bank account. It takes away the material the call is built on.

Be a Ghost.