Welcome to the Clark Howard Show. Our mission is to serve you and empower you so you make

better financial decisions in your life. One of the things we do on this show is we

help you avoid ripoffs and scams. Today I'm going to share with you where the scams

are really, really, really hot right now and what you need to be aware of so you don't

get taken. By the way, if you ever are taken by a scam, do not guilt yourself that you

did something wrong. You did not do something wrong. You were not done. I hear over and

over again from people. I can't believe I was so stupid. Never ever say that. Remember,

these fraudsters all day long are trying to figure out how to rip you off. It's what

they do is their full time job and we're busy with our lives and everything going on.

So stop with the guilt trip towards yourself. Something else? Credit card debt. Do you

know credit card rates are in an all time record high in the modern era. We're going to

talk through how do you tackle that debt? What do you need to know about it? But right

now let's talk scams. So there's new extensive data from the Federal Trade Commission on

what are the top scams going on and absolutely far in a way. Number one are pretextures or

sometimes referred to as imposter's where someone pretends to be someone else or from an

organization they're not with and they rip you off and it is like way out there as the

top thing. And so I want you to know that this is the area you need to really, really

be on guard of all different ways, especially now through text messaging where something

will look just like an alert you may have received from your credit card company or a notice

from a bank or notice from any business you do business with and a lot lately Google

and Apple where you'll get notices saying there's been a breach of your account. And

think about it. It's true. Breaches happen all the time. So the criminals go where we're

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