How to keep your Christmas money SAFE
This time of year brings special offers increased online shopping and stress - a perfect storm for fraudsters to target. But you can protect yourself with these tips on...
BEING fraud-vigilant is an exhausting, 24/7 activity and a distraction from our daily lives — and the fraudsters want you to be distracted so that they can take your money. We’ve all seen our screen light up when we receive the text message. It tells us we need to make a payment immediately, or to follow a link to ensure our funds are safe.
At AIB we are committed to protecting customers against the threats associated with fraud. We all lead very busy lives, especially in the lead up to Christmas. We spend lots of our time online and see so many ads with special offers that it can be hard to differentiate the genuine ones from the scams.
We are continuously investing to enhance our fraud monitoring systems in response to new and existing fraud trends, and to educate our customers via online messaging, emails and targeted social media alerts. This is to help our customers keep their money safe.
Scammers are becoming more organised and sophisticated. The equipment they use to set up the scams can be bought easily on the dark web. Word of how readily available and easy to use the equipment is spreads in online forums and so it is also being used by individuals as well as criminal gangs.
The organised gangs are global and professional, and some even operate call centres to contact the customers whose account details have been captured. They are well trained and convincing as they have already accessed the customers’ accounts to get details to help them seem legitimate. So how can we stay one step ahead of them?
I want to share some of the most common scams with you. These scams are extremely prevalent, and all age groups are falling victim to the sophisticated methods.
When people are defrauded, the common link is often that they’re distracted when the text or call is received, they believe it is genuine and give all their details to the criminals. In these circumstances they have not been hacked, they have given the criminal all the information and codes required for them to access their accounts online and make payments.
To help protect yourself from these criminals, keep in mind the phrase ‘don’t click on the link’ and be sure to get a second opinion before reacting to a call or message.
EXAMPLES OF DEADLY SCAMS
1 THE most common scam now is sending text messages (smishing) which is sometimes followed up by a
Keep in mind the phrase ‘don’t click on the link’
phone call (vishing). These texts and phone calls will have an urgent call to action and the scammer needs your help to complete the fraud.
Examples of the most common texts are requesting you pay a toll, advising you that your parcel is stuck in customs or a delivery fee is required, or texts purporting to be from utility companies or your bank.
The link contained in this text will bring you to a fraudulent website and ask you to confirm what financial institution you bank with along with your personal and bank card details.
The scammers will present what appears to be a genuine bank website and request further login information. Scammers regularly follow up these texts with phone calls, using software to mimic the bank’s genuine phone number, and request further security codes.
The advice to avoid falling victim to this is always ‘don’t click on the link’ and if you get a call out of the blue from your financial institution, hang up and call back on a verified contact number.
We have recently seen customers being duped into not only disclosing their personal and financial information but also handing over their physical debit cards to taxi drivers as they believe they are being delivered to genuine bank staff. No financial institution will call to your house to collect your debit card for disposal.
2 OTHER prevalent scams include the ‘Mum and Dad’ WhatsApp scam. Despite its name, all age groups are being targeted with a message which claims to be from a family member.
The message will always come from an unknown number and advise that their own phone is broken and they are in urgent need of financial support.
Never make a payment or provide card information without verbally confirming with your family member or friend that the request is legitimate. Call them on their normal number to check.
3 INVESTMENT scams promising great returns are also on the rise and in some cases, criminals are using legitimate bank staff names and high-quality brochures that have been copied from real ones to make the scam look genuine. If an investment sounds too good to be true, it generally is.
Never invest your money without verifying the legitimacy of the investment and seeking advice from a professional. Don’t give your contact details to online websites where you cannot verify who owns and operates them. Always check the investment company is regulated to provide such investments, look them up online and call them to see if they have details of your new account before transferring your funds.
4 PAYDAY loan scams naturally increase at this time of year. These companies claim to offer loans to people who may not qualify for one with a financial institution. They target those who need credit and will always look for an upfront payment in advance for insurance purposes or to secure the loan.
The unsuspecting customer will be asked to transfer the funds to another bank account and will never hear from the loan company again. If you wish to apply for a loan, always use a regulated provider.
5 EMAIL scams. Emails are how many of us connect and do business every day, but they are also used by scammers for their own financial gain. Never click on links in emails or make payments on foot of an email instruction. Be particularly cautious. in work situations if you receive an unusual payment instruction from someone senior, like the CEO. Always contact the sender on a known and verified number to confirm that the details are correct and that the payment instructions are genuine.
6 WITH big discount shopping days like sales even when buying any thing online, we want to make sure everyone is protecting their money. Sometimes a bargain is too good to be true.
Only make purchases from a genuine website — a padlock on the address bar is a good indicator and if it’s not there, beware.
Also take a closer look at website addresses — scammers often.
make very minor variations, such as adding a hyphen, when setting up fake websites, to make them appear genuine. DON’T let ghost brokering haunt you. When booking something online like accommodation or a holiday, check that when you click on a link on a genuine website, you are staying on the same website. Scammers can insert false ads on genuine sites to bring you to their own website.
A form of this is ghost brokering, a term used to describe a fake travel company. Scammers are targeting people who are genuinely searching for holiday deals online. An ad is presented to them and personal information is provided. These ads can display as ‘sponsored’, sometimes at the top of your search engine feed, and look and feel very convincing.
The scammer will engage with the victim via email or messaging services and entice them into purchasing a holiday deal.
This holiday will never materialise, and the scammer uses the person’s card details to purchase several other genuine holidays. They may also look for an online payment for an offer that does not exist. 8 A MONEY mule is a term used to describe a person who allows their bank account to be used to launder the proceeds of crime by withdrawing or transferring illegally acquired funds on behalf of someone else. Money mules can be recruited through social media apps or indeed in person. They are offered cash in return for handing over their bank account details to criminals.
People who are defrauded will have their money moved into these accounts and then moved onwards through a network of accounts. Allowing your account to be used by a criminal for financial gain is illegal and can result in a criminal record if convicted. Teenagers and young adults are the most common age group targeted to become money mules, but everyone should be aware of the consequences of selling their bank account.
WE’RE all aware of frauds and scams, having received fraud prevention messages and warnings from our bank, on social media, in newspapers,
It only takes a moment to get caught off guard
on TV and on radio. We all think it won’t happen to us, but it only takes a moment to get caught off guard and if we make a mistake, it can have serious financial consequences.
Take a moment to ask yourself ‘is this legitimate?’ before reacting to a call or message. Businesses should ensure that all staff are aware of current scams and that no payments are made without a robust approval process involving a number of people.
Customers should ensure that every unexpected or unusual request for payment is treated with extreme caution. If you think you have been a victim of fraud, contact your bank immediately and report it to the Gardaí.
The Online Banking Security Centre on the AIB website has details of specific current fraud threats that are targeting our customers and what they can do to protect their finances.
We work closely with other banks and the Banking and Payments Federation of Ireland, Gardaí, telecom companies (telcos) and the regulator to prevent fraud, and a cooperative approach is the only solution.
In particular, we are engaged in the FraudSmart education programme and with telcos to limit the opportunities for telephone networks to be misused by fraudsters, for example by sending ‘smishing’ SMS messages and masking phone numbers to disguise the true origin of calls.
Fraud prevention needs to be a whole of society approach and we will continue to be a key driver of this.
The bank has multiple layers of two factor payment authentication and fraud monitoring in place to protect customers when banking online and making payments.
Controls include sending texts and mobile banking in-app messages to customers to confirm some transaction types and by manually reviewing others.