People who have already lost money to online fraud are being targeted a second time by criminals wearing the badge of the very agency that investigates such crimes. The FBI has warned that scammers are impersonating its personnel and its Internet Crime Complaint Center, known as IC3, to deceive and re-victimize past fraud victims. The bureau describes an evolving scheme that leans on fake social media profiles, spoofed government websites and artificial-intelligence deepfakes to make the con more convincing than earlier versions.
A recovery scam aimed at earlier victims
The warning centers on a tactic investigators call reloading, or a double-dip scam. Fraudsters seek out people who have previously reported financial fraud, or who have said they intend to file a complaint, and then approach them claiming to have recovered the stolen funds or offering to help retrieve the money. That offer of rescue is itself the trap, a ruse to extract more money or personal information from someone already reeling from a loss.
Complainants have reported being contacted in several ways, the bureau said, including by email, by phone, and through advertisements or messages on social media and online forums. Almost all of the reports share the same hook: the scammer claims to have recovered the victim’s lost funds or offers assistance in recovering them. Because the target has genuinely been defrauded, the pitch aligns neatly with what that person most wants to hear, which is part of what makes the scheme dangerous.
Fake FBI profiles and spoofed complaint sites
One variant plays out on social media. After a victim begins to suspect fraud and mentions filing a complaint with IC3, an account impersonating an FBI agent reaches out, often through Facebook Messenger, and moves the conversation to encrypted apps such as Telegram. The impersonator sends a link supposedly to update the submitted IC3 report, but the link may carry malicious code or serve to collect additional financial data. The bureau laid out the mechanics in its public service announcement, posted to the IC3 website.
A second variant uses counterfeit websites. Scammers have built spoofed pages that mimic the structure and content of the genuine IC3 site, but the imitation only permits a user to interact with a single complaint form. That form asks for a name, phone number, email address, scam type and estimated financial loss, then returns a reference number and a promise that someone will be in touch. Clicking any other link simply loops back to the home page, a telltale sign that the site exists solely to capture the information a visitor types in.
How deepfakes make the con more believable
The newest wrinkle is synthetic media. The bureau said scammers have posted AI-generated videos, commonly called deepfakes, that depict a senior FBI leader encouraging users to submit complaints on the fraudulent IC3 look-alike site. Deepfakes can convincingly place words in the mouth of a recognizable official, lending an unearned air of authority to a scam and steering viewers toward the fake portal.
Investigators note that criminals also generate deepfake video for live chats meant to prove that an online contact is a real person, or to impersonate executives and law enforcement in real time. Coupled with caller-ID spoofing and cloned voices, the technology allows fraudsters to manufacture the appearance of legitimacy across a phone call, a video window or a web page. The FBI advises looking for subtle imperfections, such as distorted hands, irregular facial features, mismatched shadows or unnatural movement, and listening for the tonal oddities of AI-generated voices.
What the real IC3 will and will not do
Much of the bureau’s guidance boils down to a set of firm boundaries about how the agency operates. IC3 does not maintain a social media presence and does not investigate crimes or recover funds through Facebook, Telegram or similar platforms, so any profile or page claiming to represent it, or offering to recover lost money, is fraudulent. The center will never directly contact individuals by phone, email, social media, chat apps or public forums; if more information is needed, people will be reached by FBI employees from local field offices or by other law enforcement officers.
The agency also stresses that it will never ask for payment to recover lost funds, nor refer anyone to a company that charges for such recovery. That single rule cuts through most recovery scams, which almost always end in a demand for money, gift cards or cryptocurrency framed as a fee or a formality. This latest notice builds on earlier alerts, including a 2025 warning that threat actors were spoofing the IC3 website.
Steps to avoid being targeted again
To reach the legitimate portal, the bureau recommends typing www.ic3.gov directly into a browser’s address bar rather than relying on a search engine, and avoiding any “sponsored” results, which are frequently paid imitators. Users should verify that the site’s address ends in .gov and refuse to enter sensitive information anywhere they cannot confirm is authentic. Anyone who has fallen for the scheme is urged to file a complaint at the real IC3 site with as much detail as possible, and victims aged 60 or older can get help through the Justice Department’s Elder Justice Hotline at 1-833-372-8311. The warning remains active, and the bureau has continued to publicize it as reports accumulate.
This article was produced with the assistance of AI and reviewed by Morning Overview editors prior to publication.
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