Our cooperation partner, Watchlist Internet, receiving increasing reports of so-called authority scams. In this scam, criminals pose as authorities, such as the police or another authority.
In this case, the criminals pose as the “Salzburg State Police Department” or the “State Police Youth Protection Brigade”. Those affected receive emails that contain the subject “convocation” or “summons”. We have listed an example of the email text here:
“Hello,
you have a summons against yourself.
Please read the document carefully.
State Police Directorate”
In the attached letter, those affected are asked to respond to the email and justify themselves. We assume that the criminals want to filter out the people who would potentially respond to future demands for money.
We advise you to ignore the message and do not respond to any requests for money!

How to spot authority scams
- Sender email address: Look closely at the email address. In this case, the emails come from gmail.com or libertymail.co addresses. This is not an official police email address.
- Missing salutation: If there is no salutation and you are only addressed with a “Hello” or “Dear Madam, Dear Sir”, you can assume that the letter was sent en masse to countless people.
- No specific description of the crime: You are accused of a crime. But what exactly it is is not explained - i.e. when, what, where was consumed or shared.
- Time pressure and numerous threats: Writing creates pressure to respond immediately. If you do not respond within 72 hours, a warrant will allegedly be issued for your arrest. There is also the threat that you will be recorded as a “sex offender” and your personal information will be made public. This is not an official procedure; the criminals want to cause panic among the recipients of the message.
What should you do if you receive an email like this?
- Have you also received one of these messages? There is no need to worry. Simply delete the message or move the email to your spam or junk folder.
- Did you reply to the message? There is no reason to worry here either. Remember that criminals will send you more fake emails in the future. Be careful! If you receive demands for money from criminals, we advise you to simply ignore them.
- Have you already transferred money? In this case, you should contact the police immediately and file a report. More information is available here. If the money was not transferred long ago, you can also try to get the money back - unfortunately the chances of success are very low.
Advice & Help
For specific advice requests, please contact the relevant offices that Watchlist Internet has listed for you “Advice & Help”
Source: Watchlist Internet
This might also be of interest: Warning about fake emails from the police about “sex blackmail”
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