'Real-looking phony text message': Parking ticket text scam sweeps Milwaukee

MILWAUKEE (CBS 58) -- The city of Milwaukee is warning anyone who parks in the city about a massive parking ticket scam.

It says you have an unpaid parking invoice, and to pay it promptly or receive a $35 late fee.

The city believes this message is hitting thousands of phones.

Scammers are getting creative in how they want to get ahold of our information.

"First of all, it does not specify the vehicle that you have. Some folks may have several vehicles registered to their name," said Alex Holden, chief information security officer of Hold Security.

Holden is analyzing the text message hitting thousands of phones across Milwaukee.

"The rest looks relatively realistic," said Holden.

A phony text giving you a link to an unpaid parking ticket, but if you pay that $4 and 35 cents, Holden says you just opened up your bank to a scammer.

"You most likely just gave your credit card number to the bad guys," said Holden.

Alderman Lemont Westmoreland said the city of Milwaukee will never send you a text regarding a parking ticket.

In fact, the city will never send a text asking for any sort of money, period.

Alderman Westmoreland pointed out that the link does not even go to a city of Milwaukee website.

"The City will NEVER send a text asking for money. The phone number isn't a Milwaukee area code. The website isn't the City of Milwaukee’s website address," said Alderman Westmoreland.

Holden says scammers are getting more sophisticated with the help of AI and believes the hackers used AI to create this text.

"It's absolutely grammatically correct, and it's structured correctly," said Holden.

Tiffany Schultz, with the Better Business Bureau, says while the normal scammer signs aren't there, there are still suspicious aspects if you take a closer look.

"Cities are usually a dot gov, so that's a dead giveaway. No one is going to ask you to type that into your browser," Schultz said.

This scam isn't just hitting us here at home, it's nationwide. Places like Detroit and Charlotte are seeing the exact same texts.

"Because this is a nationwide scam, they build this with AI help but are customizing it per state or city," said Holden.

Holden says the best thing you can do is ignore the text, report it, and block it from your phone.