The threat of being a phishing scam victim is a part of our everyday lives.
From telemarketers looking to make a quick buck to fraudulent websites spoofing the helpless into relinquishing personal information, we’re surrounded by people who prey on others.
Such ploys aren’t limited to our personal lives. Scam artists promising Mine Safety & Health Administration (MSHA) certification have victimized a number of mining companies in recent months. Buzz Stanley, a former MSHA inspector who now serves as executive director of the Oklahoma Miner Training Institute, has heard several firsthand accounts from victims.
“One lady sent five or six of her employees off and found a deal online for ‘MSHA training,’” Stanley says. “She paid them $1,800 to do this online training.”
In this unfortunate instance, the “training” involved watching videos online. The woman’s employees completed this process, but their company never received MSHA training certificates after the fact.
The woman reached back out to the training provider, which told her to contact MSHA directly to obtain certificates. So she reached out to MSHA, which, of course, could not issue her employees certificates. The agency, after all, was not the one administering the training.
It was some hack in a basement or in another country for all the victim knows. According to Stanley, the woman immediately called the false service provider back to demand a refund. But by that time the scam artist had stopped answering her calls.
“This is going on and on and on,” Stanley says.
Trusted training
The Oklahoma Miner Training Institute, like a number of mine safety and health organizations across the United States, offers free training courses every quarter. These courses are held at the institute’s home within Eastern Oklahoma State College in Wilburton, Oklahoma.
The course schedule doesn’t always work out in a trainee’s favor, though, and some mining companies don’t want to pay to send their employees off-site to be trained. So representatives from the institute will appear where needed for a fee.
“We try to work with the operators to help them out so they can get quality training,” Stanley says.
Stanley, who also spent 38 years as a coal miner, travels the state of Oklahoma delivering MSHA Part 46 and Part 48 training when needed. So hearing of mining companies who leap at the “opportunity” to complete MSHA training online by watching a handful of videos is news that floors him.
In a second reported spoofing incident, one miner told Stanley how his company completed its annual training online by watching turkey hunting videos.
“He said they sat there for eight hours and watched videos about turkey hunting,” Stanley says. “My mouth fell open. Did you ever question what turkey hunting has to do with mining?”
Stanley has received questions from other miners wondering about online services they see claiming MSHA certification can be offered online. He responds plainly.
“People will bring up Skype or online training, and I’ll tell them you better watch what you’re doing,” he says. “Because then what you’ve got is something you can’t use.”
As a certified MSHA instructor, Stanley will not sign off on a miner who is not trained in a classroom setting. Aggregate producers should assume other instructors operate the same way.
“What appears to be a good deal is not always a good deal,” Stanley says. “Know who you’re talking to. Check into their background, and know what’s going on.”