A Cambridge businesswoman was scammed out of £90,000 by fraudsters claiming to be her bank’s anti-fraud team, after they modified their caller ID so it would flash up as Metro Bank’s number.
The worrying incident began in February this year, when the woman – who was given a fictitious name Jane Holden by the Guardian – received four missed calls from the same number, which appeared as Metro Bank’s call centre.
She told the newspaper that after finally picking up the phone, the ‘professional’ sounding person on the other end identified themselves as an employee of Metro Bank’s fraud division.
If you read the full article, you can see why she got scammed – and she is not as tech savvy as she would like us to believe.
However… There are some rules of thumb here. Terminate the call and call your bank back – if you have another phone, use that. Log on to your online account and check it for yourself. Also, the bank will not ask you for verification codes. They just don’t do this.
So, although the scammers clearly had sufficient information to spoof the call and provide a convincing story, if she had stopped and thought about it instead of letting them set the pace, she could have avoided this. Yes, I know, when this kind of thing happens, the panic sets in. That’s what these scumbags are relying on.
Always, always, hang up the call and then contact your bank using their phone number directly. Do not continue the call. If it is genuine, the bank will understand. As it is highly unlikely to be genuine, then you have saved yourself from being scammed.
But you MUST make sure that the call has been released. Plenty of scammers keep the line open, and have a fake dialling tone handy, so when the person being scammed picks up again they assume they are listening to dialling tone from BT (or whoever), when they are not. If you have another phone handy make the call to your bank with that, whilst keeping the incoming line open…
Yes. That’s why I mentioned using another phone. Either that or allow a reasonable amount of time before making the call. Another thing you can do is reboot your phone as that will terminate all connections.
I had a similar sort of call a few months ago, warning me of a suspected transaction on my account. The caller then began making requests for me to prove my identity before going any further. I hung-up and then went to the nearest branch of my bank, which is 12 miles away and no longer on my local High Street. There was no suspicious activity on my account.
NEVER, EVER discuss anything to do with banking over the phone, go into the bank and speak with a genuine employee. It’s the only sure way.