Posts

A woman from Northern Ireland was targeted by a fraudster through Facebook, who conned her into a three year relationship.

 The victim, who wishes to remain anonymous, was lured into the relationship which started three years ago, but just three months in he started to ask for money from her.

It started with the romance fraudster asking her for money so he could send his children to England for a better education, but developed into him asking for money to invest in Ghana and Dubai. In total, she sent the man more than £300,000 which was deposited into different accounts … Read more

Action Fraud is warning people to be careful when booking their pilgrimages.

Action Fraud, the reporting service, is warning anyone looking to book an upcoming pilgrimage to the Middle East, to exercise extreme caution as fraudsters are specifically targeting Hajj trips.

Up to 25,000 British Muslims will be booking trips to Mecca over the coming months to perform Hajj in the autumn.

The total reported loss to victims was £185,967 betw,,een July and December 2018. The public are urged to check that their travel company is a member of a recognised association such as ABTA

Last year, in the period … Read more

A businessman from Doncaster has been jailed for eight and a half years for conning footballer Gary Cahill.

The Sun reported that Chelsea and England star Cahill, was conned out of £1 million by Stewart Groves who had offered the defender his services, but instead deposited the cash into his own bank accounts.

Stewart Groves has been disqualified for ten years after misappropriating £800,000 of one of his clients investments. At a crown court hearing, Groves was found guilty of fraud by misrepresentation and sentenced to 8 and a half years. Earlier this year, Lincoln County Court issued Groves … Read more

Victims are being tricked into revealing Two Factor Authentication (2FA) codes and extorted for money with the threat of having their personal photos shared publicly if they don’t pay up.

Action Fraud has received multiple reports about Snapchat and Instagram accounts being compromised as a result of users being tricked into handing over 2FA codes to fraudsters. The victims are then extorted for money with the threat of having their personal photos shared publicly.

Action Fraud are telling users to not respond to messages that ask for your login details or two-factor authentication (2FA) codes. These can be used to … Read more

Action Fraud have released a statement saying that organised criminal groups led by married couples and families are scamming pension holders to the tune of millions of pounds.

Action Fraud say criminal investigations involving regulators, government agencies and police forces are currently ongoing into a number of these gangs. In some cases, the fraudsters have hired fraudulent financial experts with pension experience to run large-scale scams. The fraudsters would not be able to run these scams without the insider knowledge of fraudulent experts.

Victims report receiving cold-calls, offers of free pension reviews and promises of high returns. However a ban … Read more

Action Fraud are warning that a new round of Fake TV licensing emails are being circulated and, in December alone, 200 crime reports were made to Action Fraud.

Back in October, Action Fraud released a warning about TV Licensing phishing emails, after a large number of reports were received. New TV Licensing phishing emails are part of larger fraud, in which criminals are calling victims and claiming to be bank employees, convincing them to hand over their money.

According to Action Fraud, Fraudsters are sending out fake TV Licence emails regarding refunds and payment issues to people across the … Read more

A recent increase in cases of Timeshare owners being targeted for further exploitation has prompted Action Fraud to warn owners to be on the lookout. Scammers are actively seeking out Timeshare owners who may be vulnerable or previously mis-sold their Timeshares and telling them they are owed compensation. The scammers pose as reputable companies offering unsuspecting customers exit from their timeshare burdens for a fee and promising to be able to reclaim compensation.

The scammers are aware of the Timeshare owners personal information from their previous investments which provides them with false credibility. They request upfront fees from owners … Read more

As people are becoming more and more aware of the types of scams out there, scammers are having to create new ones, to replace the old ones. We are all aware of Phising but have you heard about Vishing, Spoofing, Twishing and Smishing ?

Neither had we, but these are just some of the digital-age scams financial investigations unit’s all over the country are looking at. Here are some of the scams to look out for.

First there was Phishing, where fraudsters send out spoof emails in an attempt to steal personal information, such as passwords and banks … Read more

A Financial scam is committed every 15 seconds in the UK and can leave those affected in financial turmoil.

 

 

It has a devastating impact and often targets the most vulnerable people in society. Many people are left feeling socially isolated and too uncomfortable to discuss it with their friends and family.

A new scheme to target the problem, which was deemed out of control, was launched in May 2017. The Banking Protocol is a rapid response scheme and has, so far, led to 197 arrests and prevented £24 Million worth of attempted fraud.

Since March 2018, all 45 … Read more