Co-host of MTV's 'Catfish' warns audience about 'spoofing' scams: 'This could happen to anyone'
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Kamie Crawford, one of the co-hosts of MTV’s Catfish, recently opened up on TikTok about essentially getting catfished herself — and now, she’s hoping to warn others before they become a victim, too.
Unlike most of the people on Catfish, Crawford didn’t fall for a fake online relationship. Instead, she found herself caught up in a Venmo scam, and it all happened because of something known as “spoofing.”
According to Investopedia, spoofing is a type of cyber scam that involves “disguising an email address, display name, phone number, text message or website URL to convince a target that they are interacting with a known, trusted source.”
“I figure if this could happen to me, and I am literally the host of Catfish, then this could happen to anyone, so listen up,” Crawford says in a stitch with TikToker Katie Ring (@the.self.defense.girl) on TikTok.
The co-host describes how she received a call from an unknown number during a recent trip to Las Vegas. Used to getting scam calls, Crawford says she picked up the phone fully expecting to “cuss out” the person on the other end of the line. Instead, she wound up listening to what they had to say.
The caller claimed to be from Venmo and said that the company flagged fraudulent activity on her account. In order to make sure Crawford’s account was secure, she would have to follow a few simple steps, the voice told her.
Still on guard, Crawford says she was pretty sure this was a scam in action. But then the caller said to look out for a verification code sent via text that would help secure her account.
“And sure enough, a text comes through from Venmo’s phone number,” Crawford claims in the TikTok before showing a screenshot of the text thread.
Somehow, the scammer was able to send a text that appeared to be from the same number that would send Crawford payment updates from Venmo. The message looked legit to her since it warned against giving the verification code to anyone else and even told her to beware of scammers.
Ironically, she was already falling victim to one.
“I don’t know if it was the drinks that I had or the fact that I got a real text message from Venmo’s real number, but I’m thinking like, ‘Oh, this has to be Venmo,'” she admits in the clip. “So I sent the code. And guess what happened?”
As soon as Crawford checked her Venmo account, she realized she’d been scammed. Not only had Crawford’s name on the Venmo been changed to “Sherwin Frederick,” but her bank account info was changed to someone else’s — and a transfer of $1,486.85 from her Venmo wallet to their bank had already been initiated.
That’s when she knew what was really going on.
“I got f***ing scammed, b****,” Crawford admits.
Crawford was able to get a refund after reporting the incident to Venmo, but she says she had to jump through some hoops to rectify the situation. The whole thing, she says, has left her wary of using digital payment services in the future.
“There’s really no safe place anymore because now people are spoofing calls from your bank,” Crawford concludes.
Spoofing calls are also known as phishing attacks, which are becoming much more common and highly sophisticated. In fact, a study by the messaging security provider SlashNext found a 61% increase in the rate of phishing attacks in 2022 compared to 2021, CNBC reported.
After sharing her story on TikTok, however, a lot of people wrote in Crawford’s comments that the scammer might have gained access to her account a different way.
“Seems like they did a forgot passcode type thing and had a code sent to you, and had you give it to them,” wrote @tokyo_photographer.
“I think that they get ahold of basic info like name / email / username, and then while they’re on the phone with you they attempt to log in and hit,” added @haleydevol.
Whatever the case may be, Crawford is now warning others not to fall into the same trap.
“My advice? Better safe than sorry,” Crawford advises. “Do not answer any texts, do not answer any calls. … If anything, go to the bank and talk to someone at the bank.”
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