The Federal Trade Commission (FTC) has released an alert on scams related to the Equifax data breach. FTC warns consumers to be wary of calls or emails purporting to be from Equifax agents.

Legitimate Equifax representatives will not contact consumers to ask for verification of their information.

FTC warns that those affected by the data breach might see other scams. Other calls might try to trick targets into disclosing their personal information. Here are some tips for recognizing and preventing phone scams and imposter scams:

  • Don’t give personal information.
  • Don’t provide any personal or financial information unless you’ve initiated the call and it’s to a phone number you know is correct.
  • Don’t trust caller ID. Scammers can spoof their numbers so it looks like they are calling from a particular company, even when they’re not.

If you get a robocall, hang up. Don’t press 1 to speak to a live operator or any other key to take your number off the list. If you respond by pressing any number, it will probably just lead to more robocalls.