Please, Mum! WhatsApp fraudsters pose as loved ones to steal money
After chatting on WhatsApp about the latest series of Ozark, Paula Leonard’s* daughter broached a difficult topic: she needed two bills paid, as she was locked out of her online bank account after getting a new phone.
Leonard immediately moved to help her US-based daughter as she has done in the past.
“There was this chit-chat and a lot of use of the word mum,” she says. “I think that was so clever because you have a Pavlovian response to ‘mum’ from your children. That gets you.”
Over the next hour she arranged two bank transfers to the same account – one for £1,523 and another for £1,345.
It was when there was a request for a third sum of £1,276, and a claim that bailiffs were threatening action, that Leonard, 75, realised there may be a problem. “While I was texting her, I emailed her and got a message back to say ‘That isn’t me mum, it must be a scam.’”
It was then that she phoned the bank.
Leonard is a victim of the latest form of fraud to balloon online, in which people are contacted by fraudsters claiming to be members of their family, who say they have lost their mobile and also access to online banking to pay bills.
Lloyds Bank says the number of cases reported by customers soared by the end of last year, with victims losing an average of £1,950 each.
When Leonard tried to ring the number during the scam, there was a crackling line, then a text message arrived saying “I think my mic is broken”.
When she did not respond to the final demand, the criminals continued with “Mum?” and “Is it done?”.
Then Leonard received texts from another number, with a photograph of a woman, saying: “I’m really sorry that my son Joshua has done this to you, and I’ll do what I can to get the money back.” She regarded this as an attempt by the
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