Scammers and what you can do to protect yourself from them.
In today’s society we are seeing more and more scammers using the internet to con people into sending them their money.
These stings can be in any form such as criminals impersonating Police, Bank’s, and Businesses.
Criminals do not want to get caught so they will use or recruit other people/businesses to hide the profits of their crimes, this is called Money Laundering.
Putting the funds made from criminal enterprises through a legitimate company, is their way of trying to hide their funds made from a criminal enterprise.
Scammers will use many different ways to contact you, today’s technology I.E Internet & Smartphones have made this easier for them, by either contacting you via email, apps, text messages or social media.
All scams start differently but all end the same way with you been out of pocket, sometimes by the thousands.
Lately we have seen the scams starting with them offering to pay YOU some money to accept an amount of money into your account and you then transfer it to another account, keeping a certain amount for yourself. This is in effect making you a money mule and therefore making you part of their criminal organisation, this is a criminal offence and can hold up to a 14-year prison sentence in the UK.
For safety reasons never open a bank account in your name for someone else or agree to move money for someone else.
To protect yourself remember to:
Contact your bank if you receive substantial amounts of money that you were not expecting, deposited into your account.
Be wary of job offers that are either solely online and you never speak to a person only via message, or jobs that were sent to you via social media, what’s app, email, or text messages.
Investment scammers will try to get you to pay money to invest in their fake opportunity by creating top quality genuine looking materials to show that they are authentic and trustworthy these can include:
Online adverts, extremely well-presented websites, social media pages and high quality professional looking documents.
An investment scam could be done by the scammers creating a legitimate looking “investment” website which would be offering the opportunity to make a lot of money quickly, this site will look extremely professional, and they will get you to fill in a contact form for more information.
You could start receiving sleek marketing material and constant phone calls telling you to act fast before you miss out, this is good technique to pressure you into handing over your money.
Once they have you drawn in and you have handed over either all or most of your money, all contact stops and your money has gone.
Also, when investing into cryptocurrencies, shares, stocks or even bonds, making sure these are legitimate companies before investing could save you losing your entire life savings.
Always confirm the identity of the individual contacting you, if they are legit, they shouldn’t mind providing you with this information, check online for reviews for any reference to it been a scam, and always call any company directly you can find the correct information on the FCA website if they are legitimate and registered https://register.fca.org.uk/s/
Taking great care to check it isn’t a clone company, here is a link to the FCA’s investment warning list.
Everyday we are learning about what tricks the scammers are using and how they trick people into parting with their money, but everyday scammers are also learning new ways to trick people.
Some of the scammers are so convincing and make everything seem legitimate. They will use leaflets, make websites and social media accounts, and build them up to make them look legitimate, even using celebrities names to make the sites, leaflets and social media pages look more legitimate. Sometimes the same scammers will even go the extent of pretending to be another company who can help you get all your money back, but for an upfront fee which you will instantly loose, and you will not get any of the money back.
Keep an eye out for scammers who pretend to be the Police, they’ll try to convince you that your money isn’t safe by either saying they need you to help with their investigation and to move your money from your account to one of their “safe accounts” or to withdraw cash and arrange for a courier (another scammer) to come collect it and take it to a safer place.
These scammers may try to get you to transfer the money to another account for safety.
Buy items such as gold or jewellery and ask you to pass them to them.
They may ask for you to withdraw a considerable sum of money, for safe keeping.
If anyone asks you to pay a fee up front, this can be either for a purchase or even a rent deposit when just viewing a property, then stop and think about if this could be a swindle before handing over any money.
Remember these key tips to help protect yourself and your money:
Never share your bank account or security information in full.
Never share the PIN for you bank card.
Do not give out personal or financial information, unless you know that caller is genuine.
Be wary of unexpected calls, the bank or police will NEVER ask you to move your money to another a count or to withdraw it for safe keeping.
Do not tell anyone your online banking details.
Do not rely on caller I.D as this can be manipulated by the scammers too.
Stay Safe