Why the toll road text scam is out of control across the U.S., and Apple, Android can’t do anything to stop it

Published

4 months ago

March 13, 2025

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The texts first started arriving on Eric Moyer’s phone in February. They warned him that if he didn’t pay his FastTrak lane tolls by February 21, he could face a fine and lose his license.

The Virginia Beach resident did what the majority of people do: ignore them. But there was enough hesitation to at least double-check.

“I knew they were a scam immediately; however, I had to verify my intuition, of course; I accessed my E-ZPass account to ensure, plus I knew that I had not utilized a toll road in recent months,” Moyer said, adding that his wife’s phone also received the same blitz of menacing messages.

But not everyone ignores them, and, unlike Moyer, not everyone has an E-ZPass account to check. Some people do pay, which makes the whole endeavor worthwhile for hackers, and which is why the toll texts keep coming. And coming.

In fact, cybersecurity firm Trend Micro has seen a 900% increase in searches for “toll road scams” in the last three months, meaning, the company says, that these scams are hitting everyone, everywhere, and hard.

“It is obviously working; they are getting victims to pay it. This one apparently seems to be going on a lot longer than we normally see these things,” said Jon Clay, vice president of threat intelligence at Trend Micro.

In this case, the “they” are likely Chinese criminal gangs working from wherever they can find a foothold, including Southeast Asia, which Clay says Chinese criminal gangs are turning into a hot spot.

“They are basically building big data centers in the jungle,” Clay said, and staffing them with scammers.

Clay also says that absent a big news event that scammers can latch onto, the toll scam fills the void. But he said tax-time scams will soon really ramp up.

What really makes the toll scam effective is that it is cheap and easy for scammers to utilize. They can buy numbers in bulk and send out millions of texts. A handful of people will be persuaded to pay the $3 toll fee to avoid the (fictional) threat of fines or licensing revocation. But Clay says they aren’t just interested in the $3; it’s your personal information that you’ll enter that has far more value.

“Once they have that, they can scam you for other things,” Clay said.

Aidan Holland, senior security researcher at threat research platform Censys, has been extensively tracking toll scams and agrees that they are likely perpetuated by Chinese criminals overseas. Holland has identified 60,000 domains, which he estimates cost the criminals $90,000 to buy in bulk and use to launch attacks.

“You don’t invest that much unless you are getting some kind of return,” Holland said.

State-run toll systems across the U.S. targeted

The domains use variations of state-run toll systems like Georgia’s Peach Pass, Florida’s Sun Pass, or Texas’s Texas Tag. They also have more domains from generic-sounding toll systems for people who don’t have a specific toll system in their state. He’s traced the domains to Chinese networks, which point to a Chinese origin.

Apple’s iPhones are supposed to have a safety feature that strips the link from the text, but hackers are finding ways to evade that, making it easier to fall for the ruse.

“They are constantly changing tactics,” Holland said.

Apple did not respond to a request for comment.

“Apple doesn’t do anything about it. … Android will add it to their spam list so you won’t get texts from the same number, but then the scammers will just change numbers,” Clay said. “Apple has done a wonderful job of telling everyone their phone is secure, and they are, but not from this kind of attack,” Clay added.

Across the 241 miles of the Ohio Turnpike, the scam first appeared on the state’s radar in April 2024, but it has been ramping up recently, said a spokesman for the Ohio public road system.

“Over the past two weeks, our customer service center has received a record number of calls from customers and mobile device users in area codes across Ohio and elsewhere about the texting scam,” the spokesman said. The good news, he says, is that the calls have been tailing off in recent days, likely because of growing awareness, and he said personally he knows of few who have fallen for the scam.

However, the issue has become acute enough that the Ohio Turnpike and Infrastructure Commission produced a public service video to raise awareness.

Ultimately, scammers are banking on human nature to make scams effective.

“Scammers want people to panic, not pause, so they use fear and urgency to rush people into clicking before they spot the scam,” said Amy Bunn, online safety advocate at McAfee. Bunn says that AI tools are making this type of scan more prevalent.

“Greater access to AI tools helps cybercriminals create a higher volume of convincing text messages that trick people into sharing sensitive personal or payment information – like they’d enter when paying a toll road fine,” Bunn said. McAfee research found that toll scams nearly quadrupled in volume from early January to the end of February this year.

Even if you know the text is fraudulent, she says it is important to avoid the urge to text them a few choice words or a simple “stop.”

Don’t engage at all.

“Even a seemingly innocent reply to the message can tip scammers off that your number is live and active,” Bunn said.

Holland worries that the ones falling for the scam are society’s most vulnerable: the elderly and less tech-savvy people, even children who may receive the messages on their phones.

Others have an easier out for spotting a fraud.

“I got my first text yesterday; I just deleted it. The funny thing about it is that I don’t drive and haven’t for over 30 years,” said Millie Lewis, 77, of Cleves, Ohio.

Technology

Google promotes ‘AI Mode’ on home page ‘Doodle’

Published

2 hours ago

July 1, 2025

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Google promotes ‘AI Mode’ on home page 'Doodle'

Google CEO Sundar Pichai addresses the crowd during Google’s annual I/O developers conference in Mountain View, California on May 20, 2025.

Camille Cohen | AFP | Getty Images

The Google Doodle is Alphabet’s most valuable piece of real estate, and on Tuesday, the company used that space to promote “AI Mode,” its latest AI search product.

Google’s Chrome browser landing pages and Google’s home page featured an animated image that, when clicked, leads users to AI Mode, the company’s latest search product. The doodle image also includes a share button.

The promotion of AI Mode on the Google Doodle comes as the tech company makes efforts to expose more users to its latest AI features amid pressure from artificial intelligence startups. That includes OpenAI which makes ChatGPT, Anthropic which makes Claude and Perplexity AI, which bills itself as an “AI-powered answer engine.”

Google’s “Doodle” Tuesday directed users to its search chatbot-like experience “AI Mode”

AI Mode is Google’s chatbot-like experience for complex user questions. The company began displaying AI Mode alongside its search results page in March.

“Search whatever’s on your mind and get AI-powered responses,” the product description reads when clicked from the home page.

AI Mode is powered by Google’s flagship AI model Gemini, and the tool has rolled out to more U.S. users since its launch. Users can ask AI Mode questions using text, voice or images. Google says AI Mode makes it easier to find answers to complex questions that might have previously required multiple searches.

In May, Google tested the AI Mode feature directly beneath the Google search bar, replacing the “I’m Feeling Lucky” widget — a place where Google rarely makes changes.

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Technology

How a beer-making process is used to make cleaner disposable diapers

Published

3 hours ago

July 1, 2025

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How a beer-making process is used to make cleaner disposable diapers

Clean Start: Startup focuses on making diapers renewable

Disposable diapers are a massive environmental offender. Roughly 300,000 of them are sent to landfills or incinerated every minute, according to the World Economic Forum, and they take hundreds of years to decompose. It’s a $60 billion business.

One alternative approach has been compostable diapers, which can be made out of wood pulp or bamboo. But composting services aren’t universally available and some of the products are less absorbent than normal nappies, critics say.

A growing number of parents are also turning to cloth diapers, but they only make up about 20% of the U.S. market.

ZymoChem is attacking the diaper problem from a different angle. Harshal Chokhawala, CEO of ZymoChem, said that 60% to 80% of a typical diaper consists of fossil-based plastics. And half of that is an ingredient called super absorbent polymer, or SAP.

“What we have created is a low carbon footprint bio-based and biodegradable version of this super absorbent polymer,” Chokhawala said.

ZymoChem, with operations in San Leandro, California, and Burlington, Vermont, invented this new type of absorbent by using a fermentation process to convert a renewable resource — sugar — from corn into biodegradable materials. It’s similar to making beer.

“We’re at a point now where we’re very close to being at cost parity with fossil based manufacturing of super absorbents,” said Chokhawala.

The company’s drop-in absorbents can be added into other diapers, which makes it different from environmentally conscious companies like Charlie Banana, Kudos and Hiro, which sell their own brand of diapers.

ZymoChem doesn’t yet have a diaper product on the market. But Lindy Fishburne, managing partner at Breakout Ventures and an investor in the company, says it’s a scalable model.

“Being able to build and grow with biology allows us to unlock a circular economy and a supply chain that is no longer petro-derived, which opens up the opportunities of where you can manufacture and how you secure supply chains,” Fishburne said.

Other investors include Toyota Ventures, GS Futures, KDT Ventures, Cavallo Ventures and Lululemon. The company has raised a total of $35 million.

The Lululemon partnership shows that it’s not just about diapers. ZymoChem’s bio-based materials can also be used in other hygiene products and in bio-based nylon. Lululemon recently said it will use it in some of its leggings, which were traditionally made with petroleum.

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Technology

Figma files for IPO on NYSE, plans to ‘take big swings’ with acquisitions

Published

4 hours ago

July 1, 2025

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Figma files for IPO on NYSE, plans to 'take big swings' with acquisitions

Dylan Field, co-founder and CEO of Figma, appears at the Bloomberg Technology Summit in San Francisco on May 9, 2024.

David Paul Morris | Bloomberg | Getty Images

Design software company Figma filed for an IPO on Tuesday, and plans to trade on the New York Stock Exchange under ticker symbol “FIG.”

The offering would be one of the hotly anticipated IPOs in recent years given Figma’s growth rate and its high private market valuation. In late 2023, a $20 billion acquisition agreement with Adobe was scrapped due to regulatory concerns in the U.K. That led Adobe to pay Figma a $1 billion termination fee.

Revenue in the first quarter increased 46% to $228.2 million from $156.2 million in the same period a year ago, according to Figma’s prospectus. The company recorded a net income of $44.9 million, compared to $13.5 million a year earlier.

As of March 31, Figma had around 450,000 customers. Of those, 1,031 were contributing at least $100,000 a year to annual revenue, up 47% from a year earlier. Clients include Amazon Web Services, Google, Microsoft and Netflix. More than half of revenue comes from outside the U.S.

Figma didn’t say how many shares it plans to sell in the IPO. The company was valued at $12.5 billion in a tender offer last year, and in April it announced that it had confidentially filed for an IPO with the SEC.

Wall Street banks predicted a rush of IPOs after Donald Trump won the U.S. presidential election in November following a dry spell dating back to late 2021, when soaring inflation and rising interest rates pushed investors out of risky assets. While President Trump’s announcement of sweeping tariffs in April roiled markets and led a number of companies to delay their plans, activity has been picking up of late.

Stablecoin issuer Circle doubled in value in its early June debut and is now up more than sixfold from its IPO price for a market cap of almost $43 billion. Online banking company Chime also debuted in June, following Hinge Health’s IPO in May. Artificial infrastructure provider CoreWeave, which went public in March, jumped 46% in June and has quadrupled since its offering.

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Buy now, pay later company Klarna, based in the U.K., filed for a U.S. IPO in March, as did ticket marketplace StubHub.

Figma was founded in 2012 by CEO Dylan Field, 33, and Evan Wallace, and is based in San Francisco. The company had 1,646 employees as of March 31.

Before establishing Figma, Field spent over two years at Brown University, where he met Wallace. Field then took a Thiel Fellowship “to pursue entrepreneurial projects,” according to the filing. The two-year program that Founders Fund partner Peter Thiel established in 2011 gives young entrepreneurs a $200,000 grant along with support from founders and investors, according to an online description.

Field is the biggest individual owner of Figma, with 56.6 million Class B shares and 51.1% of voting power ahead of the IPO. He said in a letter to investors that it was time for Figma to buck the “trend of many amazing companies staying privately indefinitely.”

Databricks, SpaceX and Stripe are among high-valued companies that are still private.

“Some of the obvious benefits such as good corporate hygiene, brand awareness, liquidity, stronger currency and access to capital markets apply,” he wrote, explaining the decision. “More importantly, I like the idea of our community sharing in the ownership of Figma — and the best way to accomplish this is through public markets.”

Field added that as a public company, investors should “expect us to take big swings,” including through acquisitions. In April Figma bought the assets and team of an unnamed technology company for $14 million, according to the filing.

The IPO will also mark another much-needed win for Silicon Valley venture firms, which are in need of returns after the multi-year slump. Index Ventures is the largest outside shareholder, with a 17% stake before the offering, according to the filing. Greylock owns 16%, Kleiner Perkins controls 14% and Sequoia has a stake of 8.7%.

Figma said it faces “intense competition” and that loss of market share would “adversely affect our business,” but didn’t name any specific competitors.

Over 13 million people use Figma per month, and only one-third of them are designers, according to the filing. In March the company announced Figma Sites, a tool that turns designs into working websites. It’s one of a few new products that diversify the company away from its collaborative service for crafting app and website designs.

As of March 31, Figma had $1.54 billion in cash, cash equivalents and marketable securities.

Using its cash, Figma has begun investing in digital currencies. In 2024, Figma’s board authorized a $55 million investment into a Bitwise Bitcoin exchange-traded fund. As of March 31, the holding was worth $69.5 million, according to the filing. In May, the board approved a $30 million investment in Bitcoin, and Figma spent the money on USD Coin, which is a stablecoin.

Morgan Stanley and Goldman Sachs are leading the deal along with Allen and Co. and JPMorgan Chase.

Correction: A prior version of this story had the incorrect stock exchange in the headline.

— CNBC’s Ari Levy and Jonathan Vanian contributed to this report.

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