WAGGA police are warning locals of a fake traffic infringement scam that is hitting every pocket of the country, including the Riverina.
Scores of locals are receiving a bogus traffic infringement, claiming to be from Australian Federal Police (AFP), via email.
It demands recipients pay about $150 within 30 days of the issued date, but a virus infects your computer upon clicking on the link.
While the AFP swiftly moved to shut down the scam, Wagga police are taking the extra caution of re-issuing the stern warnings in the wake of local residents receiving the email.
“It would appear that residents in the Wagga and Riverina areas are still receiving emails in relation to this scam outlined on the AFP Facebook page in April 2015,” Wagga police said.
“The AFP do not send infringements via email, and if clicked on a virus will infect your computer.
“Please share with your family in friends to ensure that they do not activate this virus on their computers.”
Wagga’s Leonie Moore was among those to receive the email and potentially fall victim to the national scam.
“I got one of these but deleted it,” she said.
“For one thing, the AFP don't handle traffic infringements.”
AFP manager of cyber crime operations, Commander David McLean, told Fairfax that many people "had been compromised" and implored anyone who received the email to "delete it immediately".
"If links within the message are clicked, the computer is infected with malware which renders them inoperable,” he said.
“Then recipients are asked to pay large sums of money to reactivate their emails.”
It is believed the ransomware that is then activated demands the user to pay thousands of dollars to reactivate the affected computer.
"To protect yourself from all scams, check that your antivirus software is current and consider running a virus scan on your computer,” Commander McLean said.
AFP said they had received numerous reports about the scam email which had "done the rounds" last year and had "reared its ugly head again".
In April last year, AFP issued an urgent warning on the same matter after the email was reported to be circulating throughout Australia and internationally.
The scam re-surfacing has renewed the AFP to urge people to ensure anti-virus software on computers is current and asked those who may have received the email to consider running a virus scan.
If you have clicked on the link in the scam email, please report the incident to the ACORN at http://report.acorn.gov.au/
