Alert: Fraudulent email impersonating Payments Canada
Details:
Delivery: Email
Subject Line: Incoming Transaction — Payments Canada
Request: You receive an email indicating it’s from Payments Canada’s regulation team, with an image of the Payments Canada logo at the bottom. The perpetrator is telling you that they are sending you a transaction on behalf of Payments Canada, and they have attached a file that they claim has further details.
In a follow-up email, the perpetrator is requesting that you contact them directly to verify the payment.
What you should know:
Payments Canada will never reach out to the general public to initiate any sort of payment. This is a scam. Scams often appear to be sent from organizations or personal contacts, typically asking for financial or personal information.
What you should do:
- Never open attachments or click on links from suspicious emails or text messages.
- If the email or text message appears to be suspicious — even if it comes from a person or organization you know — contact them to verify if it’s legitimate.
- Never provide personal information in an email, text message or over the phone.
- Please notify us by forwarding a screenshot of the text message to info@payments.ca
- Delete the email or text message.
- If you suspect you’ve been a victim of fraud or notice unauthorized activity on your bank account, please contact your financial institution directly.
For more information on how to protect yourself from phishing emails or fraudulent websites, please visit: getcybersafe.gc.ca
