Wanted to post here and share with you an experience that has happened with me today. i’ve been subject to a very sofisticated fraud activity. Below is what happened.
Received a phone call from the following number 020 3872 0620 at 1:43pm which i didn’t answer because i didn’t know the number
directly after a min, received a text message from: Alert with the following text: A Monzo agent will contact you in regards to suspicious activity on your account, on our unique helpline number 0800 802 1281 or +44 203 872 0620 when calling from abroad.
Then another call from the same number which I have unfortunately answered because the number seemed coming from Monzo.
The person speaking to me, knew my name, my address even my date of birth! He was claiming that he is from monzo, also stating that the number he is calling me from is exactly the same that was on the back of my monzo card, he told me that the system has detected fraudulent activities coming from birmingham and he needed to check what’s happening and that my account is currently under security review
During this time i was able to login to my monzo mobile app and saw there were multipe attempts to do online transactions to deliveroo (the person seems to be rehearsed extremely well and knew the plot, and how to answer my questions) (the person seemed to be have a pretty good english accent!)
During our call he told me that he was able to pinpoint the location of the fraudster using their system and was able to lure me to forward him the login email i’ve exposed my pin (yes huge mistake from my side but the person was extremely good in sucking out the info from me!!). He asked me to delete the app from my phone so that they can locate the correct ip address of the fraudsters! (This is the email they asked me to forward the login email to: support@monzo-team.uk)
now they had access to my account at monzo!! Luckily I only had small amount in there. Next thing they did, from my monzo account they noticed i had a different account at a different bank and they tried to ask me questions about my second account saying that the fraudsters are trying to access my other bank account. Here my suspicious levels got very high and started realising that i am being scammed
while they were asking questions i have started to object and decline their request, next thing he did, he said he will contact the other bank support and they will call me back. Indeed I get a call from what they claimed “fraud department of the bank”. Now it’s a lady speaking claiming she’s from the fraud department and also started asking questions which i knew it was fraud and had declined and did not accept to answer her questions and closed the call. The first person called back stating that if i don’t cooperate i will lose my money and they will not be able to help (the second call came from: 0345 740 4004). The scammers tried to use very convincing statements that “we are FCA regulated and you need to cooperate to help”, “if you don’t cooperate we will not be able to support and help and you will be legally liable to pay any fees etc…” my reply here was i understand and i will take this risk and i will personally call the other bank. Here we hung up and i directly called the fraud department, i have reinstalled the app and tried to chat with the monzo team, as soon as i did and was able to send a message that i am being scammed, i got logged out of the app.
They’ve updated the email address login of monzo to the following claris892@mail.uk
Once i got logged out, i also noticed that my account has been dried up and my overdraft has been used!
One message that they used repeatedly while speaking with me is “not to worry, not to worry, for security reasons” watch out for these words and do worry a lot!!
i’ve also received an email that my account email has been changed and now i am out of my monzo account at all
i’ve called my second bank, resetted all of my passwords, then called monzo on the phone to explain the situation
With the help of monzo i was able to get access to my account but then monzo team over chat logged me out and now my account is locked with no access
currently waiting to hear back from monzo
*Update: they created a contact in monzo and transferred the fund to themselves:
I hope this exprience help everyone who’s reading this blog! Please do not fall in the same scam i did and however anyone says they are from the bank and asmuch as details they know about you, if they ask you to share any details about logins do not do so!! I’ve definitely learned the lesson here but just to let you know, these people are extremely experienced and sure does seem they’ve done it a lot before and they were able to convince me.
Thanks for sharing and I’m sorry this happened. Hopefully Monzo can track down the funds and try and get some or all of it back.
Let this be a lesson, always say you’ll be more comfortable hanging up and calling the number on the back of your card. If they try to convince you otherwise, it’s a scam.
I’m also very sorry these people are still at it, and I hope you get back what was fraudulently taken from you
Time for another concentrated multi-tab round of mailbait-dot-info ‘presentations’ to support@monzo-team.uk (although they’ll likely be reading this anyway to help steer through any obstructions)
Low-life bottom-feeding scamming fraudsters need to be exposed & charged. Before then, inconvenienced. Very inconvenienced. Kill that inbox server
Not at all, no subscriptions sign-ups involved. You only enter ‘your’ email as the recipient.
I mis-typed mine unfortunately,instead of entering me@daman.com I slipped and entered support@monzo-team.uk then clicked on ‘Go’ before I’d realised the error. Multiple times. Oh well
I’m not the NCA but pretty sure a group this sophisticated would never send stolen money to their personal account. That will be either another fraud victim or a paid participant about to get a CIFAS marker after the money has been funneled elsewhere.
Really hope the NCA can get to the bottom of this and convict the perpetrators, but I doubt it
I’m glad the OP didn’t lose huge amounts of money and appreciate them taking the time to raise the alarm to others.
Thanks for sharing this and I’m so sorry that you had to go through it
I have, though, removed the screenshot of the account that they paid money to. It’s quite possible that the person named is as much of a victim as you, and that they’re just moving money around between compromised accounts.
I’m sorry you had to go through this - hope you can recover swiftly.
It’s interesting I think that they got your details before they spoke to you. Do you know/suspect at all how they got your personal info already?
I imagine they managed to get sufficient data from a breach somewhere else, and assumed you might be a Monzo customer and gave it a shot - and I can see how when recieving a call from the Monzo number (which will have been spoofed), and they present you with your own details as verification, how trustworthy it could seem.
The trick of “get you to delete the app and distract you for as long as possible” is a good/terrible one - it gives the scammer the time to do all the fraud they need to do while you don’t have the app / get locked out.
So the top few tips of bank security:
Never trust anyone claiming to be your bank calling you directly. Always call them. Especially if they tell you not to.
Never trust any email claiming to be your bank - and always check the headers / from address etc - and if neccessary verify with your bank.
These stories do also lead me to generally quesiton bank security - I feel with other banks you have more lines of defence before you’ve possibly compromised your account. Account ID, Password, Unique Code, sometimes a generated code/log in code, etc.
While I do believe Monzo is just as secure (and I would recommend putting 2FA on your email too) - I wonder if Monzo is easier to target from a social engineering point of view.
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Anarchist
(Press ‘Help’ search ‘Contact us’ or email help@monzo.com or call 0800 802 1281)
22
Me too. Most of the emails I receive from banks say something along the lines of “you’ll know this email is from us because we address you by name and include the first part of your postcode.”
(although they’ll likely be reading this anyway to help steer through any obstructions)
