Clark County, Nevada's Comprehensive Planning Department issued a public warning on September 7 after residents holding active building permits began receiving invoice emails demanding payment for a fabricated "compensation fee." The messages cited real case numbers and came from a look-alike address, clarkcountynv.gov@usa.com, that the county says is not a valid county domain.
The county's advisory instructs anyone who suspects a scam to call its planning office directly rather than reply to the email, and notes that a legitimate invoice will always include the customer's assigned planner by name.
Napa County, California issued a near-identical warning the same month, describing emails impersonating its Planning, Building and Environmental Services Director and demanding wire-transfer payment on pending applications. Two independent county governments describing the same mechanism in the same month is the more useful fact here than either warning taken alone.
Ten days after Clark County's warning, the FBI's Internet Crime Complaint Center updated a four-year-old advisory on law-enforcement and government-official impersonation: nearly 61,000 complaints and losses exceeding $1.6 billion, reported between January 2025 and July 2026.
The specific detail inside one of these emails — a real permit number, a real employee's name — is not what makes it credible. It's evidence the sender obtained that detail somewhere. A mismatched sender domain and an unusual payment request are the two facts worth checking before any payment is considered.
Larigent tracks developments like these as part of its ongoing intelligence work.
If this is your family
If a parent or older relative owns property, remind them a real government office never demands payment by wire transfer, a payment app, or cryptocurrency to keep a permit active. A call to the office's own published number is always safer than replying to the email or clicking a link inside it.
Sources
Clark County warns of phishing scam targeting planning customers — Fox5 Las Vegas, September 7, 2026
Warning: Escalating phishing scam impersonating Napa County departments and staff — Napa County, CA
Scammers Impersonating Law Enforcement and Government Officials in Fraud Schemes — FBI Internet Crime Complaint Center, PSA I-091726-PSA, September 17, 2026