Facebook scam

[Qunk]

I spent a lot of last night on the phone to the fraud action helpline (0300 123 2040) and NatWest on behalf of my 70 year old lodger who has just been duped into handing over £1700 to a Facebook scammer. I’ve made jokes myself about Nigerian Princes in the past but never actually witnessed somebody on the receiving end before and I tell you what, it’s horrific. I don’t think I’ve ever been so thoroughly sad and angry before. Looking at the messages between him and the scammer myself it’s so obvious what was happening but to a non-savvy pensioner it’s easy to see how somebody could be so easily duped, and he was utterly convinced he was getting a hundred grand on Friday.

The point is, keep an eye on what your older loved ones are up to online, and please intervene if you get even the slightest sniff that they are being manipulated. Fuck sake

[Nomoreheroes]

Sorry to hear that. Our elderly neighbours got caught a couple of times with different scams. Fortunately, the second time, they were helped by the bank and police, when they turned up at the bank to move all of their money out of their account in order to 'secure their money and help with a corruption investigation at the bank'.

The sad thing now is that if you get caught once, scammers will keep coming back to try to fleece you again and again. They are relentless. And with the focus these days on online privacy, its difficult for the police to identify who and where they are in order to try to stop them.

[Qunk]

Sorry to hear that. Our elderly neighbours got caught a couple of times with different scams. Fortunately, the second time, they were helped by the bank and police, when they turned up at the bank to move all of their money out of their account in order to 'secure their money and help with a corruption investigation at the bank'.

The sad thing now is that if you get caught once, scammers will keep coming back to try to fleece you again and again. They are relentless. And with the focus these days on online privacy, its difficult for the police to identify who and where they are in order to try to stop them.

Sorry to hear about your neighbours. And you are absolutely right about their modus operandi, they’ll keep coming back to the scene of the crime. Utter scum.

The lady from the fraud people was amazing, took literally everything I said down. I felt NatWest were less helpful but I’ll give them some benefit of the doubt as I know recovering the money is both complicated and sometimes impossible. I’m hoping they’ll reimburse him even if it isn’t recoverable as it is so clear he has been scammed. I’m just going to take the bull by the horns and go straight to the financial ombudsman I think. If it was £200 I’d let it take its course, but obviously £1700 is a significant amount of money.

The other problem is (somewhat ironically) that the scammers don’t have his bank details, he paid them in gift cards, which makes things even trickier.

[Batch]

And with the focus these days on online privacy, its difficult for the police to identify who and where they are[/u] in order to try to stop them.

That's the point isn't it, online is so easy to hide your footprints.

Thankfully my mum is now pretty good and asking others what they think. Case in point the other week "do you think they are selling off this higher value  Wilko stock for peanuts" - no mum. No I don't.

Sorry your lodger got caught up. I would never say I'd never get caught out myself.

[tans]

Sorry to hear about your neighbours. And you are absolutely right about their modus operandi, they’ll keep coming back to the scene of the crime. Utter scum.

The lady from the fraud people was amazing, took literally everything I said down. I felt NatWest were less helpful but I’ll give them some benefit of the doubt as I know recovering the money is both complicated and sometimes impossible. I’m hoping they’ll reimburse him even if it isn’t recoverable as it is so clear he has been scammed. I’m just going to take the bull by the horns and go straight to the financial ombudsman I think. If it was £200 I’d let it take its course, but obviously £1700 is a significant amount of money.

The other problem is (somewhat ironically) that the scammers don’t have his bank details, he paid them in gift cards, which makes things even trickier.

The banks are normally pretty good, they have a banking protocol in place and normally try and keep the customer in the branch until police arrive to investigate. Of course they cant stop them leaving etcif they want to go. Action Fraud are pretty good too.

[adje]

That's terrible,as a pensioner myself I like to think I'd spot a scam but these fuckers are getting cleverer. What was the scam can I ask?

[Qunk]

It was not much different to the traditional Nigerian Prince scams. A genuine friend of his had his account cloned (not hacked), contacted my lodger and it snowballed from there. I'm at work now but I'll take some photos this evening and post them on here so people can see exactly what to look for.

[adje]

It was not much different to the traditional Nigerian Prince scams. A genuine friend of his had his account cloned (not hacked), contacted my lodger and it snowballed from there. I'm at work now but I'll take some photos this evening and post them on here so people can see exactly what to look for.

Cheers

[Jimmy HaveHave]

It was not much different to the traditional Nigerian Prince scams. A genuine friend of his had his account cloned (not hacked), contacted my lodger and it snowballed from there. I'm at work now but I'll take some photos this evening and post them on here so people can see exactly what to look for.

Sorry to hear what’s happened and hope that he gets his money back.

[Qunk]

As promised.

This is the first message he received. I have taken a couple of others of subsequent messages but the images are too large to post here and, to be honest, this one probably says all you'll need to know. The account which sent it too him seemed connected to his real life friend as far as anybody would be able to tell. If it was me I would, naturally, have called the friend to check his account hadn't been hacked/cloned, but that didn't occur to my pal, hence the hook line and sinker.

EDIT: Argh, sorry, that wasn't the first message. I'm trying to compress the actual first message enough that I can post it. Bear with me!

[Qunk]

This should work now

[adje]

Nasty. Cheers

[Qunk]

Nasty. Cheers

No problem