Worcester Business Journal

wbjournal.com | November 16, 2026 | Worcester Business Journal 9 Congratulations John La Stella on being selected as one of the 2026 Worcester Business Journal's Notable Veteran Leaders New England's Commercial-Industrial Roofer Doing it all... safely! 200 Mount Laurel Circle Shirley, MA 01464 978-425-0001 www.nstarroofing.com said. Auburn Town Manager Dori Vecchio said the town is aware of the ongoing scams. "ese scams oen contain invoices designed to look identical to official Auburn documents with detailed descriptions of active applications," Vecchio explained. "ankfully, we are not aware of any applicants who have fallen victim to these scam attempts and we are taking preventative action to notify applicants and send reminders when we're alerted to another round of scam emails. "Many communities across the commonwealth have been targeted by these sophisticated scams and we want to bring awareness and encourage everyone to verify the legitimacy of any suspicious emails through a secondary source. Anyone in receipt of these emails should contact our office or visit auburnma.gov." West Boylston applicant targeted Marc Frieden, who serves on the West Boylston Planning Board, said an applicant in that town was targeted by the same scam with an email Sept. 9 that demanded $7,600 for outstanding administrative fees with an attached invoice. e applicant called the town about the email. "He (the applicant) had already received Planning Board approval and was all paid and the (scammers) picked up his name, my name, the town, our format of letters … and sent an email saying they were going to be issued a cease and desist order if they didn't pay the fees so we can move forward," Frieden said. "He called the town and accounting was yelling at me asking why I was sending out invoices and that we don't do invoices. I said, 'I didn't do it.' "Everything looked legitimate, including the link they sent, except for this made-up extension usa.com. It was very clever how they made the fake link," Frieden said. "I said, 'is is definitely fake, but wow. Really good phishing email.' I was impressed." Frieden said the scam could lead to a significant amount of money for applicants if it goes undetected and that applicants are more likely to catch a phishing email than the town itself. "Towns are just grossly unprepared for keeping track of this stuff," he said. "ere is no big IT department to put protections in place. In a company, they have accounting departments or accounts receivable to do something. With a municipality, there are things coming from everywhere to different departments that are not all in the same structure. (Scammers) are attacking a good place to attack." Worcester proactively raising aware- ness A spokesperson for Worcester City Manager Eric D. Batista said officials are aware of cybercriminals trying to scam applicants, and the city has issued several public service announcements on its website about the scams. "Over the past year, this has been a well-documented tactic used to impersonate many municipalities in Massachusetts and nationally," the spokesperson said, noting the FBI posted a notice on its website about the scams earlier this year. "It's important to note that these scams are not connected to a data breach," the spokesperson said. "e bad actors use publicly available data associated with planning and zoning processes in their targeting. ey are not using city accounts or systems to execute these attacks." Worcester also added a notice on the scams to its planning and regulatory services site with a red banner alerting people to the issue that provides official email and mailing addresses: "Important Notice: Please be advised of an ongoing scam where City officials are being impersonated asking for payment related to planning and zoning permits. e City of Worcester will never request wire transfers." Additionally, members of the Planning office include the educational message in their email signature for people communicating with City staff, the spokesperson said. According to the the FBI's website: e emails contain detailed, accurate information about planning and zoning requests, including property addresses, case numbers and the true names of city and county officials; use professional language, formatting and imagery consistent with legitimate government communications for planning and zoning applications, including review processes, planning commission procedures, regulatory compliance and relevant ordinances; the email addresses contain usernames similar to city or county planning and zoning departments but originate from non-governmental domains, such as "@usa.com" oen timing their delivery to coincide with ongoing communications with city and county officials regarding the permitting process. W

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