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As you are likely aware if you've found this article, messages claiming to be your boss, or other trusted individuals received via text message should always be treated with distrust. SMS/Text message scams are increasingly common and are either completely randomly sent, or targeted. The scam tries to bait you and would likely have included a follow-up SMS with a malicious link or a request (e.g. buy a Gift Card for me).
Assuming this was targeted, your phone number (associated with your first or full name) could have been obtained in a number of ways: a data breach (e.g. LinkedIn), a paid information service, or potentially from open-source (publicly available) information. For instance, identity monitoring services can alert you if your phone number is leaked on the dark web. In this case, all the threat actor would need to presume is some association with LeTourneau University.
Unfortunately, in most cases, random SMS messages like this cannot be prevented, so please continue to be wary of this kind of targeted scam or other generic scams (e.g. Amazon, PayPal, etc.).
That said, you can take two actions on scam SMS messages like these: 1) report them and 2) block them.
- 1) How to report numbers to your wireless carrier through your phone can depend on the messaging app, but typically you can do the following:
- Android:
Long-press the message > Forward > Type 7726 (which is easy to remember as 7726 = SPAM) > Send
- or -
If you use the Google messages app you can also long-press the message and tap "Report Spam" and then "OK"
- iPhone: Tap Report Junk, then tap Delete and Report Junk
- If you'd like, you could also report this as fraud to the FTC using the following link: https://reportfraud.ftc.gov/#/assistant
- 2) After reporting the number, block it to prevent additional messages from it.
Again, reporting and blocking numbers helps wireless carriers fight fraud for everyone. Thank you for being vigilant, and please let us know if you have additional questions or concerns.