The Tarbes police are noticing the surge in telephone fraud in the Hautes-Pyrenees department and the new methods of work developed by the criminals. The police are urging the public to be vigilant against fake banking consultants.
Beware of fake banking advisors who contact you by phone. The Tarbes police want to draw public attention by noticing a surge in credit card fraud since the beginning of the year. Even more convincingly, scammers have developed new methods to gain the trust of their victims, convinced that they have a bank agent from the fraud department on their phone. And the police describe different scenarios.
“The victims received a call from an advisor who alerted them to several suspicious transactions in their account and asked if they were really behind these transactions. The false advisor, wanting to reassure, indicated that he would be able to stop these fraudulent payments, but in order to do this, he would first need to confirm them. »
Once the victim was conditioned, the scammer asked his victim to open his banking app and an interface appeared. “Payment confirmation page, as when paying on an online site. The scammer had only to convince his victims to enter their security codes to allegedly reverse transactions, and the trap was closed.
Previously collected data
More than a dozen people in the Tarbes district, most of whom were customers of Crédit Agricole, got rid of 300 to 5000 euros in a few minutes. “This is called vishing, a method of voice phishing. We first observe this phenomenon in Tarbes. »
In other cases, some victims received SMS from their favorite streaming platform like Netflix or even from Amazon. This time, the customer was informed that their account was blocked due to billing issues. The client followed the link, registered his bank details, and several hundred euros were withdrawn from him. “Scammers may have acquired your personal details on the dark web and may know a lot of things before contacting you. What makes the method formidable.
If scammers use social engineering to put their victims to sleep, fortunately this grip loosens almost instantly after the call is placed. The faster we react, the more chances we have to catch up.
Act very fast
“If you have the feeling that you have fallen into a trap, you should immediately contact your bank,” the police advise. “Banking institutions can repatriate funds before they are transferred to other accounts. But the procedure cannot exceed 48 hours. The victim can also report the scam on the special Perceval platform or go to the police station or gendarmerie to file a complaint. But in order to avoid these troubles, the police remind you of a few rules that must be followed.
“The bank never asks you for security codes, much less to verify a payment that you are not the sender of, and then be able to cancel it.” When in doubt, contact your “real” banking advisor.