Motorists in the UK are being warned to avoid fake emails, sent by scammers attempting to pretend to be the Driver and Vehicle Licencing Agency.
A Tweet sent by BBC Watchdog claims that drivers are receiving emails claiming to be from the DVLA, and asking them to follow a link in order to fill out their personal information.
The scam claims that motorists are owed a refund of £239.35 for their vehicle tax, and the email carries the official DVLA logos and even legitimate-looking links to report spam and phishing emails.
#FraudFriday This week, a fake DVLA email that brazenly includes a reference to reporting phishing... that's a new one! pic.twitter.com/KnQAEmAGqF
— BBC Watchdog (@BBCWatchdog) June 2, 2017
However, drivers are urged to check the emails carefully for anything that appears suspicious, and the DVLA has said that it will never send a request to enter personal details for any reason.
In a statement, the agency said: “We don’t send e-mails or text messages with links to websites asking you to confirm your personal details or payment information. We strongly advise anyone who receives such a request not to open the link and delete the item.”
This isn’t the first time that would-be fraudsters have targeted unsuspecting motorists, with reports of both email and text scams reported to police in the past two years.
Back in 2014, fraudsters even set up a copycat website mirroring that of the Driver and Vehicle Standards Agency, which would charge drivers extra money to book their driving tests.
Both the DVSA and DVLA advise drivers who come across copycat websites or scam emails to ignore and delete them, and to flag sites up as misleading.
