Scam website helped criminals steal £50m from victims in the UK by making it appear staff from their bank were calling on business
- iSpoof.cc has scammed 200,000 people in the UK out of at least £50 million
- A total of 59,000 criminals paid subscriptions up to £5000 to use the site
- The Met Police plans to send texts to 70,000 victims to help provide evidence
- The site’s owners made £3.2 million in the country’s biggest fraud operation
A website used to scam 200,000 people in the UK out of a total of at least £50million has been shut down in the country’s biggest fraud operation.
Scammers paid a subscription to iSpoof.cc to use technology that let them to make it appear to victims they were phoning from banks such as Barclays, NatWest and Halifax.
A total of 59,000 criminals paid subscriptions of up to £5,000 to use the technology, making £3.2million for the site’s owners while they scammed vast sums from victims.
The British suspected mastermind behind the site is in custody after Scotland Yard, the FBI and European law enforcement agencies launched a joint investigation.
Scammers paid a subscription to iSpoof.cc to use technology that let them to make it appear to victims they were phoning from banks such as Barclays, NatWest and Halifax
The average loss to victims was £10,000 each, with one losing more than £3million to fraudsters using the service, Scotland Yard said.
So far £48million of losses have been reported to Action Fraud, but the real figure is likely to be far higher.
The Metropolitan Police plans to send texts to 70,000 victims today and tomorrow asking them to get in touch to give evidence.
Det Supt Helen Mance, of the Met, said fraudsters would first buy victims’ bank details on the dark web to make their approach more convincing, then used iSpoof to make a fake bank phone call to clear out their accounts, she said.
The average loss to victims was £10,000 each, with one losing more than £3million to fraudsters using the service, Scotland Yard said
Scammers made 10million fraudulent calls after the site was set up in December 2020, with 35 per cent of the victims in Britain, 40 per cent in the US and the rest scattered across Europe and Australia.
Suspected mastermind Teejai Fletcher, 34, from east London, was accused of fraud and participating in organised crime on November 7.
He was remanded in custody and will appear at Southwark Crown Court on December 6.
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