The Vermont Secretary of State’s Office is warning businesses about a new phishing scam where fraudsters are impersonating state officials from the Office of Professional Regulation (OPR).

The scam involves an email purporting to be from enforcement officials within OPR regarding an investigation or violation. The emails may attempt to get recipients to click on links to malicious sites, download malicious software, or provide sensitive information in reply.

Anyone receiving an email from someone purporting to represent OPR or another state entity should:

– check the email address to ensure it ends in Vermont.gov (and nothing else after .gov)

– preview links by hovering over them with your mouse without clicking to see where the link is attempting to take you

– look for misspellings, including incorrect spellings of Vermont

The Secretary of State encourages those with questions or concerns about communications that appear to come from state officials to contact their office by calling 802-828-2363.

Similarly, the Vermont DMV is warning of scam text messages and emails that seem to come from Vermont officials and harass drivers about unpaid tolls. The DMV reminds people that it will never send a text demanding payment for anything.

Read more: Beware of Scams: Fraudulent Messages Targeting Vermont Drivers | Department of Motor Vehicles.

Anyone who receives such a text or email can call the VT DMV at 802-828-2000 to verify the communication and can report the scam message to the FTC: https://reportfraud.ftc.gov/?orgcode=VTDMV.