As Hurricane Matthew approaches Florida, officials are warning citizens to look out for charity cons. Florida Attorney General Pam Bondi is teaming up with the website GoFundMe to confirm donations go to those affected by the storm.GoFundMe is a crowdfunding website for charity fundraising and personal causes. Spokesman Bobby Whithorne says the website is working to ensure donors can give securely, noting only one tenth of one percent of all campaigns on GoFundMe have been found to be fraudulent.
"If a campaign is created, and those funds are raised on behalf of somebody else, we won’t release those funds until that beneficiary is identified, and connected, and added to the campaign, so that the money is directly transferred to the beneficiary," Whithorne said. "We want to make sure that those that need help, get the help. And we’re working around the clock to do just that."
The Florida Attorney General’s office encourages citizens to call the state’s scam hotline before donating to any group to see if fraud complaints are filed against the campaign.
