Brush up on what to look out for by reading this story.
The National Broadband Network (NBN) was rolling out in Eric’s street. He’d seen the trucks just up the road so it was no surprise when he received a call from a telco saying they were assisting with the NBN and needed access to his computer.
Eric dutifully followed their instructions and organised access to his computer. The person who rang, a guy named Kevin, wanted to check some things and Eric saw various graphs and information flash up on the screen. It looked technical and Eric was thankful Kevin had taken the time to call him and organise everything.
Kevin said Eric’s Internet Banking had possibly become hacked and that he needed Eric to login so they could check a few things. Kevin loaded the Bank Australia website and Eric logged in.
The screen went black. Kevin said he was working on the issue.
A few moments went by and Eric heard his phone ding with a message. Kevin told him not to worry about the text, it was just a test, but to give him the numbers showing in the message so he could confirm them at his end.
Eric read out the numbers.
Kevin suddenly announced that NBN was good to go, thanked Eric for his time and gave control of the computer back.
Eric was excited to get going with the NBN and decided to pay some bills.
When he logged into Internet Banking, $4,900 had left his account today.
Confused, he called the bank. Eric soon found out that he’d given control of his computer, provided Internet banking access and handed over the second factor SMS code to a scammer.
Eric lost $4,900 with not much hope of getting it back. When you voluntarily transfer funds, banks have limited avenues to recover it. Funds can also disappear overseas pretty quickly meaning the money becomes even harder to find.
Unfortunately, when you voluntarily hand over control of your device or information, you give others the opportunity to access your banking and transfer your funds out. This means that banks have very narrow windows to chase and recover these funds. If the funds are sent overseas then the opportunity for recovery diminishes even further.
Learn more about scams, security and fraud and sign up to the ScamWatch newsletter . They’ll email you the latest info on what to look for, what scams are circulating and how to report a scam too.
