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What you need to know
Individuals have been receiving phone calls from people claiming to be a police officer or banking official
The suspect will say either:
- There has been fraudulent activity at the victims’ bank and the staff at the bank are involved, the victim is then asked to withdraw money to either keep it safe or assist the police with their investigation
- A business such as a jewellers or currency exchange is fraudulent and they require the victims’ assistance to help secure evidence by purchasing jewellery or exchange a large amount of currency to hand over to the police
- The victims’ card has been compromised and used to purchase goods by a suspect, the victim is requested to withdraw their money to keep it safe or hand over their bank card to the police
What you need to do
Your bank or the police will never:
Occasionally the victim will be told to dial a non-emergency extension of ‘161’ to receive confirmation of the individual’s bogus identity, the bogus official will advise the victim to lie about the reason for the withdrawal or purchase if challenged by staff, as the staff member is involved in the fraud.
A courier attends the victim’s home address to collect the goods the same day Often the victim is given a code word for the courier as a way of authentication
- Phone and ask you for your PIN or full banking password
- Ask you to withdraw money to hand over to them for safe-keeping
- Ask you to transfer money out of your account
- Send someone to your home to collect cash, PINs, cards to cheque books
Message Sent By
Action Fraud (Action Fraud, Administrator, National)
This is a message sent via Cheshire Police Alert. This information has been sent on behalf of Neighbourhood and Home Watch Network (Please do not reply directly to this email, please use the Reply button at the bottom of this message) Message sent by Sam Cox (NHWN, Administrator, UK)
Online vehicle fraud is costing the nation a road-rage inducing £17.8 million each year, according to new figures released by Get Safe Online and the National Fraud Intelligence Bureau (NFIB) today. This is the equivalent to 89 Aston Martin Vanquishes.
In 2013, more than 6,600 UK residents reported online vehicle fraud to the police, with an average loss of£4,078 per victim. The loss range is huge; from smaller losses of less than £50, which mainly related to holding deposits, to one unlucky victim who lost £300,000 where multiple vehicles were involved.
Fraudsters used the following methods to steal their victims’ cash:
- Part or full payment for the vehicles and then loss of contact with the “seller” accounted for nearly half (49%) of frauds
- More than a third (37%) of cases involved the payment of a deposit rather than the full amount
- Bank transfers (58%), fake eBay Invoices (14%) and fake Google Payment Systems Invoices(12%) offering non-existent “buyer protection” for the transaction were the most commonly cited payment methods
- Some victims paid funds to holding accounts on the basis that funds will be held until the buyer has received the goods and is satisfied with them
- Other victims received texts from well-known websites requesting refundable fees for car inspections
Further statistics show that:
- Nearly three quarters (71%) of victims were men
- People in their forties reported a quarter (25%) of all online vehicle fraud
- London was the most targeted city for online vehicle fraud, followed by Bristol and then Birmingham
Tony Neate, CEO of Get Safe Online, commented:
“Vehicles are valuable goods and because of this, trading them isn’t a decision that people take lightly, so it’s awful that fraudsters are exploiting popular vehicle websites. Hopefully our latest campaign will make people more aware of the risks before going online to buy or sell a vehicle.”
For the full press release, please click here.