Police Department In New York Affected By National Scam

A national online scam affected at least one police department in New York State.

Officials reminded you that you can't believe everything you see on social media. This weekend there was a national scam on Facebook that impacted police departments across the country, including at least one here in New York State.

You might have seen a post about a missing police officer over the weekend. I saw this post; it claimed that a police officer from the Batavia Police Department went missing, and the post was asking the public for help finding her.

Well, it turns out that "police officer" was also reported missing from thousands of police departments across the country.

The posts on Facebook all show a photo of the same officer and give the same description of her. They claimed she went missing and if you have any information contact your local police department.

The posts were shared by thousands of people, prompting local police to announce it was a scam.

It is not known what kind of information the scammers were trying to collect or if they were just trying to cause a distribution with local law enforcement.

Officials say there were several clues to show this was a fake post. One of the biggest ones was the past saying a "Silver Alert" was issued for the 28-year-old woman. Silver Alerts are only issued for senior citizens who go missing. Also, the photo of the officer had no clear items that showed the identity of the local police department.

Officials warn to be careful what you share on social media and do some research before just sharing.