discussion Talk about fraud

[PaulinKendal]

A plea from me - please talk to friends and family about the epidemic of banking fraud.

This summer my mother in law was defrauded of c. £17k. The bank (Barclays) has signed up to a voluntary code of conduct obliging them to take extra measures to protect vulnerable customers from fraud. My MiL is vulnerable to fraud, but the bank did nothing extra in her case. It then refused to take any responsibility or reimburse her a penny.

This type of fraud (its called an authorised push payment, or APP) is massive. In the first half of 2022, fraudsters took over £249m off unsuspecting UK a/c holders.

I took my MiL's case to the financial ombudsman and, after several months, Barclays has "reassessed" and has now agreed to repay the entire sum, along with interest on the money while it was missing. Our third request was for an apology from the bank. They've not offered any apology (surprise surprise!)

What's really surprising is that, in talking to people about this I've been shocked how many people have been defrauded (or know other people who have). There's a great deal of shame attached to being defrauded like this (undeserved shame - fraudsters are extremely good at what they do), so people tend not to talk about it, unless encouraged to do so.

My MiL was knocked for six by this, and we had to work hard to reassure her and rebuild her confidence. If someone you care about has been defrauded, you need to talk to them, folks!

 

[banjer]

Shameful response from Barclays but not surprising from them. Well done for getting a result on this, shame they had to be forced to repay the funds. I am with Lloyds and they always contact me immediately if anything remotely unusual happens with my account.

Bill

 

[Dave Ward]

Education & spreading the word is the key.
A simple way I protect my current account is by keeping the minimum in there. That is the account I make payments from, so if there is a problem, there's only so much in there that can be spirited away. I keep that account at this level by transferring money to and from my savings accounts. These accounts are only accessed by me & you have to do security checks to move cash around. It does mean I have to check my accounts more frequently, but what's 5 minutes?
The other main way I protect my money is by being suspicious, cynical and rude ( last optional ). I never believe anything, unless I can independently check it! Cold calling from 'bank/amazon/microsoft /ISP provider security' get short shrift from me.
It's not in my nature to be be any of the things above, but the rise in phishing, online & telephone scams forces me down that route
Dave

 

[Ian M]

Love cold callers on the phone I can play with them for ages. Happy to say that Door to door is illegal in Denmark, (Jehovas Witnesses dont care though...)
I have had some wonderful run ins with some shady types that have had my wife in fits of hysterical laughter. Most are selling something.
Emails: Now Danish is not the most simple of languages to learn, so 90% of fake mail is easy to spot as Google translate is still not to cleaver at Danish. As of yet I have never gotten past the heading befor seeing it as an obvious fake. Pitty. With all the African prince's, Unknow lost family, of bitcoins I have been given I should be stinking rich.

I feel for those that do get stitched up that are vulnerable, the last was a friends elderly father that got threatening letters demanding payment for "Adult films" that he had streamed over the internet. The guy can hardly turn a computer on. lol

 

[Jim R]

Well Paul I hope your Mother in Law gets over the shock and worry that these low lives caused. We left Barclays quite a few years ago because we were not happy with their service. I reckon Dave is right ....

The other main way I protect my money is by being suspicious, cynical and rude ( last optional ). I never believe anything, unless I can independently check it! Cold calling from 'bank/amazon/microsoft /ISP provider security' get short shrift from me.

 

[PaulinKendal]

I've been with Barclays all my adult life. Once the dust has settled, I'll be changing in disgust at the way it treated my MiL. I'll change to a Cumbrian-based building society, as tiny operators are much less frequently targeted by fraudsters.

 

[Tim Marlow]

Lloyds are far superior in that regard Paul. My daughter recently had her bank card stolen while she was having a panic attack and being looked after by her boyfriend. Before she even realised it had gone Lloyds were contacting her about unusual spending patterns. She contacted them in return and they blocked the card and refunded the stolen money on the same day.

 

[langy71]

Lloyds are far superior in that regard Paul. My daughter recently had her bank card stolen while she was having a panic attack and being looked after by her boyfriend. Before she even realised it had gone Lloyds were contacting her about unusual spending patterns. She contacted them in return and they blocked the card and refunded the stolen money on the same day.

Nationwide do pretty much the same thing Tim,
During our last holiday in Portugal, they blocked my card and contacted me due to there being a single payment at a cafe in East Midlands Airport..(needed coffee and a cake..lol), then another payment nine hours later at a restaurant at Vale de Lobo in Portugal..(me again buying food..lolz), I can't fault how quick they jumped on it... and similarly how quick they rectified / removed the block once they'd established it was me both times...

 

[Jim R]

We changed from Barclays to Nationwide. They do seem on the ball.

 

[stona]

Nationwide do pretty much the same thing Tim,
During our last holiday in Portugal, they blocked my card and contacted me due to there being a single payment at a cafe in East Midlands Airport..(needed coffee and a cake..lol), then another payment nine hours later at a restaurant at Vale de Lobo in Portugal..(me again buying food..lolz), I can't fault how quick they jumped on it... and similarly how quick they rectified / removed the block once they'd established it was me both times...

As do credit card companies. I was driving home from work recently when the MBNA fraud department phoned me about some suspicious spending on my card (one small item (presumably a test?) and then several flights from Dublin to the US, total several thousand pounds) It wasn't me, I've never run up that card like that! I wasn't charged, they blocked the card and I never heard anymore of it.

It can work the other way, the banks being over cautious. I once had a significant purchase (musical equipment) blocked in error, but I'd rather have to sort that out than be ripped off.

 

[PaulinKendal]

I'd rather have to sort that out than be ripped off.

Spot on. 100%.

 

[Guest]

Emails: Now Danish is not the most simple of languages to learn, so 90% of fake mail is easy to spot as Google translate is still not to cleaver at Danish. As of yet I have never gotten past the heading befor seeing it as an obvious fake.

Apparently, this is sometimes deliberate: those who spot the mistakes are probably intelligent/educated (this is not the same thing ) enough to not fall for the scam, people who don’t spot the mistakes are likely better targets.


Incidentally, spam/scam mails I got a few years ago were interesting: urging me to log in at my ISP, with a link to the real ISP’s login page in them. And then, half an hour or so later, the exact same message but linking to a fake site. The idea here seems to be that first time round, if you trust it enough click you go to the real site, the second time, you may just enter your details without checking because you recognise the message from last time.

 

[bilbo]

For those of you in the uk, if you get scam text messages you can forward them on to 7726, which is GCHQ’s anti phish number. For emails you can forward them to report@phishing.gov.uk

More info can be found here
https://www.ncsc.gov.uk/collection/phishing-scams/report-scam-text-message

 

[stona]

You used to be able to report phishing emails related to HMRC directly to HMRC, probably still can. I had loads a few years ago (pre-Covid) but they have thankfully dried up now. The Fuhrerin had one this year, which was obviously fake, asking her to pay some tax. She knew it was fake because it was for about a third of what she actually owed, but maybe that's the point. Everyone is keen to pay less!

 

[stillp]

Last year I had an email from my bank, asking me to confirm my phone numbers. All the links in the email looked good so I logged in online and checked my contact details. No problem. A couple of weeks later I had an apparently identical email except for one additional line "Click HERE to check and update your contact details". All the rest of the links were good. Like a fool, I clicked the new link, which took me to a page that looked identical to my bank, entered my landline phone number, then my mobile, then was asked for my credit card number... It would have been so easy to fall for that!
Pete

 

[stona]

Last year I had an email from my bank, asking me to confirm my phone numbers. All the links in the email looked good so I logged in online and checked my contact details. No problem. A couple of weeks later I had an apparently identical email except for one additional line "Click HERE to check and update your contact details". All the rest of the links were good. Like a fool, I clicked the new link, which took me to a page that looked identical to my bank, entered my landline phone number, then my mobile, then was asked for my credit card number... It would have been so easy to fall for that!
Pete

It would be easy, which is why many perfectly reasonable and intelligent people fall for such scams.
As a general rule, never open a link in an email.

 

[stillp]

As a general rule, never open a link in an email.

I usually don't, but was distracted this time.
Pete

 

[Guest]

Hold your mouse pointer over the link, after a few seconds that will pop up a tooltip showing where the link actually goes to. Take this example:

View attachment 471544

It’s in Dutch, as I couldn’t find an English one in my spam box right away, but basically it claims that an administrative check showed that something related to me hasn’t been registered to my e-mail address (which I censored with the red bar ) so it urges me to do that so my credit card won’t be blocked. The link in the message appears to go to “icscards.nl/actualisatie” but as you can see in the grey rectangle (the tooltip that appears when I keep my mouse pointer still over that), it actually points to linkmn.gr/actueel1 …

As soon as you notice the URL shown in the tooltip is different than the “readable” one in the message, don’t click on it! Mark the message as spam in your mailer and ignore it. (Note, of course, that this only applies if there is an actual URL (=web site address) in the message, like above. If it says “click here” or something, the URL will differ from the text even in legitimate e-mails.)

Even if the two do match, think before you click: does it seem truly legitimate? Have you had genuine dealings with the organisation that (appears to have) sent the e-mail before? Would the real organisation plausibly ask you to do what the e-mail is asking you? If you think “no” to any of these, do as above: mark as spam and ignore.