Another Thing to Fear Out There: Coronavirus Scammers

The white banner with images of red crosses had been hastily erected in front of two pop-up tents at a convenience store parking lot in central Louisville, Ky. “Covid-19 testing here,” it read.

A clutch of workers in white hazmat suits swabbed the mouths of drivers, who had each forked over $240 to learn whether they had been infected with the coronavirus.

“I have managed hospitals for years,” a man in charge told journalists and skeptical community activists at the scene on Wednesday. “We are doing things the right way.”

But nothing about the venture was right, from the workers’ failure to change gloves between customers to a bogus claim on a sign that the operation was approved by “HIPPA,” a misspelled acronym for the federal law that restricts how health data can be shared.

Instead, said David James, the president of the Louisville Metro Council, it was a flagrant attempt to con panicked citizens into handing over their money, along with social security numbers and credit card information that could be used for identity theft.

“It was ridiculous,” Mr. James said. He estimated that more than 100 people were deceived before the leaders of the apparently fake testers threw their supplies into the back of a truck and fled north up the highway.