Bogus calls from fake bank security teams target public

The Chartered Trading Standards Institute (CTSI) has received intelligence on a scam involving callers pretending to be from a bank security team.

The fraudster then asks the recipient to verify three large sums paid by using their debit card in various parts of the UK, which the recipient denies. The person is then informed that their bank is supposedly investigating fraud occurring at their local branch.

In one reported case, a recipient was asked to send £15,000 to an account to “test security procedures”. To reassure them that the call was genuine, the caller asked the recipient to read out the phone number on the back of their card and then told that the caller would call back on that number.

The number was then ‘spoofed’ by the fraudster and the recipient, falsely reassured, transferred the money.

CTSI Lead Officer, Katherine Hart, said: “These types of scams attempt to reassure the target by ‘spoofing’ the telephone number of their bank when calling. Bank security teams will never ask you to send money to any account.

“If you have concerns then you should call your bank directly – do not rely on them to call you as any number can be easily spoofed on caller ID.”

Contact your bank immediately if you think you’ve been scammed and report it to Action Fraud, or if in Scotland dial 101 and report it to Police Scotland. Advice and guidance on how to protect yourself, or your business, from fraud and cyber crime, is available at www.gov.uk/coronavirus-fraud-and-cyber-crime.

Also, the public and businesses are encouraged to join Friends Against Scams and Businesses Against Scams, respectively. These initiatives aim to protect and prevent people and businesses from becoming scam victims by empowering them to take a stand against scams.