If you’ve received a message from someone claiming to be Lakewood Church’s Joel Osteen, there’s a significant chance the person on the other end is not the man he says he is.
A Houston woman recently reported a scammer contacted her under the pastor’s name and said a recent church donation could be hers … if she gave everything she had to an orphanage in Delaware.
“How about you give me the money first and I won’t report your (expletive) to authorities? I am going to the news with this because I believe the real Joel Osteen would not conduct business this way!” the woman said she replied.
The scammer then deleted the page and disappeared.
Fox reports the scam is similar to one where a troll will copy a picture/information of one person online and then send requests to existing friends to ask for copious amounts of money.
“Unfortunately, there are some on social media who masquerade as charitable organizations for the purpose of fraudulently seeking donations. Each week, Lakewood discovers, reports and acts to remove dozens of fake pages across several social media platforms. We take this matter seriously and believe it is important for people to know that Lakewood Church never contacts individuals through social media for the purpose of soliciting donations,” a spokesperson from Lakewood said.
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