As pointed out in this article (click HERE), thieves are preparing in advance for natural disasters and other events by, among other things, purchasing domain names they might need to convince people of their credibility when the time comes for them to call unwitting contributors.

At every opportunity, you must let your past contributors and even current prospects for donations know how to verify the claims of anyone who says they are collecting on behalf of your organization. The policy should be easy to find and clearly visible on your web-page if possible.

You can indicate on your official website if you are actively campaigning by telephone, and give a phone number to verify any campaigners who say they are associated with your organization. If you have a policy that says you never call people to collect donations because of natural disasters or global events, you should say so, and let people know they should contact you, or the police, if anyone is trying to impersonate a representative of your organization in this way.

A charity should tell their campaigners not to feel offended if people question their authenticity, or if they say they would prefer to donate online or by phone by looking up the charity contact information for themselves. This should be encouraged if people are skeptical.

Anything you can do to make people aware of how to identify your campaigners in advance will help reduce the risk of fraud by people impersonating them.