The phone rings and a booming voice says you've won the morning show's cash giveaway on your city's biggest station — the one you actually listen to. He knows the DJ's name, plays a jingle in the background, and even reads back a "confirmation number." Then comes the catch: a "prize release fee," an "insurance charge," or gift-card codes to "verify your identity." It sounds real because the station is real. But the call isn't, and the way legit broadcast contests work makes the fraud easy to expose. 📻

Real stations don't cold-call winners — you call them

Here's the mechanic that scammers count on you not knowing: on-air contests almost always require the listener to initiate contact. The classic format is "caller number nine" — the DJ says "call now" and you dial the studio line to win. Text-to-win promotions work the same way: you text a keyword to a short code that the station announced on air. In both cases you reach out during a live window. A stranger dialing you out of the blue to say you won a contest you never entered is the first and biggest tell.

Even when a station gives away something that doesn't need a live call-in — a trip, concert tickets, a "listener of the day" — winners are pulled from an entry form people filled out on the station's website, and the station contacts them from a published number or an official email, not a spoofed cell number. Scammers use caller-ID spoofing to make "WXYZ 101.5" or a local area code appear on your screen, so the number looking right proves nothing. If you don't remember entering, you didn't win.

No legitimate prize ever costs money to release

This is the bright line, and it's backed by federal law. Under the FTC and the U.S. Postal Inspection Service, a genuine prize is free — you never pay to receive it. Any request for a "processing fee," "prize insurance," "customs charge," or "tax you pay us up front" is a scam, 100% of the time. Legitimate stations handle real tax paperwork the honest way: for prizes valued at $600 or more, they issue you an IRS Form 1099-MISC at year's end so you report it on your own return. They never collect cash from you to hand over what you supposedly won.

Watch the payment method just as closely as the request itself. Fraudsters demand gift cards (Apple, Google Play, Target), wire transfers, cryptocurrency, or peer-to-peer apps like Zelle and Cash App — all fast and nearly impossible to claw back. No radio or TV station has ever needed you to read the numbers off the back of a $500 gift card to "unlock" a prize. The moment money flows from you to them, the direction is backwards and the call is over.

Confirm it through the station's own published contest line

Never use a call-back number, link, or email the caller gives you — those route straight back to the scammer. Instead, hang up and go to the station's official website (type the call letters and city into your browser yourself) or the FCC-registered contact info, and find the studio request/contest line they publish for listeners. Stations are actually required to keep contest rules on file and available, so a quick "am I really a winner?" call to their real number settles it in two minutes.

While you're there, read the posted official rules for any current contest — real ones list the sponsor, entry method, start and end dates, prize value, and how winners are notified. If a supposedly huge giveaway has no rules page and no mention anywhere on the station's site or social feeds, it doesn't exist. You can also report the impersonation to the station (they want to know their name is being abused) and to the FTC at reportfraud.ftc.gov.

Stations make you call them to win, and never charge a cent to pay you — so any inbound call demanding a fee is a scam, no matter whose name is on the caller ID.