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27 investigates is looking into
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criminals targeting EBT cards to steal
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benefits from people who need them
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tonight the Ohio Department of Job and
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Family Services warn people who get SNAP
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food benefits to be extra cautious trumo
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County reporting the dean Grimley went
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looking for answers and shares tips to
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yourself how am I going to buy food for
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my kids for the rest of the
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month it it just it it hit me all at
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once like now what Charles Burns has
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fallen victim to SNAP benefit theft it
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made me very scared and upset that
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something like that could happen he
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discovered it Monday when his EBT card
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was declined to buying groceries Burns
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found a fraudulent charges on his
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account it wouldn't go through so I
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looked at my provider's app and I
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noticed two charges one for $37 and one
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$499 John Gargano the head of Trumble
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County Job and Family Services says this
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is a result of skimming an issue that
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has become more prevalent you know
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technology as it's Advanced they the
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criminals have also Advanced on how to
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obtain the information officials say
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scammers are now duplicating EBT cards
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by placing a device in credit card
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machines program administrator Richard
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Francis says the issue surfaced in
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Trumble County Tuesday he says several
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people had their benefits fraudulently
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taken but knows there could be more as
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far as we know right now it's just been
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five in our County um that's the only
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that's how many reports we've gotten so
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far uh very upset that this is happening
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to people it is not fair to people that
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need that kind of assistance there are
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some way benefit recipients can protect
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themselves is it going to work uh
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hopefully it does Gargano suggests
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unlocking EBT cards when it's not being
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used having strong PIN numbers and
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changing it monthly plus being aware of
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where you're swiping your EBT card make
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sure there's no type of a skimming
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device that could be on there but that's
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difficult for the average citizen to
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really pay attention to and look at but
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you have to have you have to try to do
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those things in Trumble County Nadine
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investigates hi everyone I'm Lindsay
2:21
Watson thanks for watching the wkbn27
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