Paste the text, the email, or just the link. Rowan reads it and tells you, in plain English, what it sees and what to do next.
You don’t have to be sure before you ask. Not being sure is the whole reason to.
None of these proves anything on its own — real messages from real companies do some of them too. They are the things worth slowing down for.
A deadline today, an account about to close, a fee that has to be paid before something bad happens. Urgency is what stops someone checking with another person, which is why it is in almost every one of these.
Gift cards, crypto, a wire, a payment app to someone you have not met. Some real businesses do take a wire or an app — the tell is being pushed toward one of these and away from a card or a normal bill, because that is the money hardest to chase once it is gone.
The name in the message and the address behind the link do not match — an extra word, a different ending, a lookalike spelling. Press and hold a link to read where it actually goes before you tap it.
A grandchild in trouble, a boss asking for a favour, a bank you bank with — from a number that has never texted you before. A familiar-looking number proves nothing either; they are easy to fake.
A delivery you did not order, a payment you did not make, a login you did not attempt. The message needs you worried enough to click, so it invents something to be worried about.
When a message worries you, check with the company yourself — using a number you already know is genuine. The back of your card, a statement, an app you already had installed, or their address typed in by hand. Not the number in the message, and not a search result that merely looks like them.
Neither one is a reason to feel foolish, and both are worth acting on today rather than tomorrow.
Replying is not the same as paying, and on its own it does not hand anyone your money. What it does confirm is that a real person reads this number, which usually means more attempts — from other numbers too. Stop replying, block the number, and don’t send a photo, a code, or a document to whoever it was.
Sometimes it can be stopped and sometimes it can’t — what decides it is usually how quickly someone is told. Who to call depends on how the money left:
Reach every one of them on a number you already know is genuine — the back of the card, a statement, an app you already had installed, or their site typed in by hand. Fraudulent “support” lines are set up to be found by people searching in a hurry, and calling one turns a bad day into a worse one.
Then report it at reportfraud.ftc.gov, and at ic3.gov if crypto was involved. Reports are how these operations get identified.
Pasting is live — that’s the box above. The other two aren’t switched on, so there is deliberately no address and no number on this page to save. We’d rather say “not yet” than hand you a mailbox that never answers.
Copy the message into the box above and tap Check it. The answer comes back on this page — nothing to install, nothing to sign into.
Send a suspicious email on to Rowan and get the answer back as a reply, in the thread it arrived in. The mailbox isn’t open yet.
Forward the message from the phone it landed on, and get the answer back in the same thread. The number isn’t live yet.
There’s nothing to sign into, and Rowan doesn’t keep the message you paste. Read the answer and close the tab.
You get the specific things that set it off — the hurry, the way it wants to be paid, a link that isn’t the company it claims to be.
Rowan can read one wrong. If a message still bothers you after a calm answer, go with that — call the company back on a number you already had.
What we hold, and for how long, is written out in the Privacy Policy.
Look at what it wants and how fast it wants it. Most of these are in a hurry, ask to be paid a way that is hard to get back, or send you to a link that is not quite the company it names. The signs above cover the ones worth knowing by heart — and if you would rather not decide alone, paste the message into the box at the top of this page.
This page is one. It is free to use, there is no account to make and nothing to install — paste the message, and Rowan tells you in plain English what it sees and what to do next. We don’t keep the message you paste.
No. The checker is this page, in whatever browser you are already reading it in — on a phone as readily as a laptop. Rowan does have an app, but it is for something else: watching an older parent’s accounts over time, which is a different job from reading one message.
Not on its own — this checks the message, not the number it came from. Paste what they sent and we can tell you a great deal; hand us the number by itself and we cannot, because a number tells you almost nothing. Plenty of scam texts arrive from ordinary numbers, and a number that looks familiar is often spoofed.
No. There is nothing to sign into here, and Rowan doesn’t keep what you paste — read the answer and close the tab. What we hold, and for how long, is written out in the Privacy Policy.
The messages you never see are the ones that worry us. Rowan watches an aging parent’s accounts for the patterns that drain a life’s savings, and tells the person who’d want to know — read-only, and nothing for her to install.
We’re onboarding families in small batches. Leave your email and we’ll write to you when a spot opens — no card, and Second Look stays free either way.
Or see how the watching works first.
Or read how each one works: the five scams that target older adults.