PA police issue 'funeral donation' fraud alert after cards compromised in parking lot hustle. How to protect yourself

Shoppers successful occidental Pennsylvania are being warned aft a scam targeting market store customers surfaced successful a Shaler Township Giant Eagle parking lot.

According to a study by CBS News Pittsburgh, authorities accidental the suspects approached radical claiming to cod donations for a funeral, past asked them to wage utilizing their debit oregon recognition cards alternatively of currency (1).

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Investigators accidental the suspects past allegedly utilized physics devices to transcript the paper accusation and marque unauthorized charges, and they judge the radical could beryllium operating successful aggregate areas.

Tap-to-pay exertion and portable paper readers person go a mean portion of modern retail transactions, enabling contactless purchases successful seconds.

As highlighted successful a 2024 nonfiction by PYMNTS, Mastercard reported contactless payments accounted for 70% of its transactions arsenic of Q3 that twelvemonth (2). And according to a 2025 study from integer banking services steadfast Cheqly, astir 90% of consumers crossed the state had utilized contactless payments earlier (3).

While this method of outgo is accelerated and convenient, it besides creates opportunities for criminals to process a outgo without the unfortunate ever seeing the afloat transaction.

In immoderate cases, victims whitethorn not spot the full earlier tapping. In others, scammers tin rapidly set the magnitude oregon determination the instrumentality retired of view, making it casual to overcharge oregon seizure paper information.

By the clip victims cheque their slope statements, they could observe they were charged for a overmuch higher magnitude than they expected, oregon that their paper accusation was compromised and utilized elsewhere.

But a large flaw with this scam tin beryllium exposed by savvy consumers who instrumentality their clip earlier they donate to a origin — the unit to wage ‘there and then’ is simply a immense reddish flag.

"It's truly important that you cognize precisely who you're giving to," Caitlin Driscoll, nationalist relations manager with the Better Business Bureau of Western Pennsylvania, told CBS (1).

"Don't beryllium acrophobic to inquire questions regarding who the donation is impacting, the enactment that they are collecting for. You don't person to springiness connected the spot."