Scammers are becoming increasingly sophisticated, using your bank’s name in emails or text messages to grab your attention, and even spoofing phone numbers to appear as if they are calling from your bank.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
One such call ended up costing a woman nearly her entire life savings.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Christy Taylor answered the phone when she saw her bank’s number on the caller ID.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
\u201cOf course, when it showed up, I answered,\u201d she said.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
The caller claimed there was a fraudulent withdrawal from her account and urged her to act immediately to protect her remaining funds.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
\u201cHe told me I needed to withdraw my money and transfer it to another bank,\u201d Taylor explained.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
It seemed like a logical step, so she followed his instructions and moved nearly $10,000 onto a prepaid debit card. She then provided the caller with the new card number.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
By the time she tried to transfer her money to another bank, Taylor discovered all her funds were gone.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
\u201c$9,600,\u201d she said. \u201cI couldn\u2019t believe it\u2014I just got scammed out of a lot of money.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Many Victims Fall for These Calls<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n Zulfikar Ramzan, chief of digital safety and threat intelligence at Aura, a digital security firm, says it\u2019s easy to fall for these scams.<\/p>\n\n\n\n \u201cIt used to be that a phone call seemed more legitimate than an email, but that\u2019s no longer the case,\u201d he said. \u201cBoth can easily be scams.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n Ramzan explained that these callers are often very persuasive, using urgent calls to action to scare victims.<\/p>\n\n\n\n \u201cThey\u2019ll say things like, \u2018If you don\u2019t follow these steps, something bad will happen,\u2019\u201d Ramzan noted.<\/p>\n\n\n\n Instead of engaging with these calls, Ramzan advises contacting your bank directly using the number on the back of your debit card, not the number that called or texted you.<\/p>\n\n\n\n When we reached out to Christy Taylor\u2019s bank to see if her transfer could be reversed, they responded after a two-week investigation, stating they couldn\u2019t help since Taylor had withdrawn the money herself.<\/p>\n\n\n\n Taylor has no paperwork to prove the scam, but she knows her money is gone.<\/p>\n\n\n\n \u201cThey took our life savings,\u201d she said.<\/p>\n\n\n\n To avoid falling victim, don\u2019t trust unexpected calls or texts from your bank. Always verify alerts by contacting your bank directly or visiting a branch.<\/p>\n\n\n\n This simple step can protect you from losing your money.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":" Scammers are becoming increasingly sophisticated, using your bank’s name in emails or text messages to grab your attention, and even spoofing phone numbers to appear as if they are calling from your bank. One such call ended up costing a woman nearly her entire life savings. Christy Taylor answered the phone when she saw her […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":4587,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[117,13,15],"tags":[188,108,109,33],"class_list":["post-4586","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-bank-scam","category-phone-scam","category-scam","tag-bank-scam","tag-phone-scam","tag-scam","tag-scam-awareness"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.ripandscam.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/4586","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.ripandscam.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.ripandscam.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.ripandscam.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.ripandscam.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=4586"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/www.ripandscam.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/4586\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":4588,"href":"https:\/\/www.ripandscam.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/4586\/revisions\/4588"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.ripandscam.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/4587"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.ripandscam.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=4586"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.ripandscam.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=4586"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.ripandscam.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=4586"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}