Santander issues ‘it’s rampant’ warning to every customer over mistake which drains bank account
Santander has issued a “high alert” scam warning as fraud reports rise by 100 per cent. The UK banking giant has warned over impersonation fraud as scammers and fraudsters pretend to be Santander staff and call clients’ employees asking for remote access to their devices.
During September, the number of attempted impersonation scams reported to Santander by its Corporate and Commercial Banking clients jumped by 100 per cent. Chris Ainsley, the head of Fraud Risk Management at Santander UK, warned: “Impersonation scams are rampant and the criminals perpetrating these crimes can be particularly devious in their approach. Businesses should remain on high alert for this threat.
“Don’t trust people who make an unsolicited call to you and say they are from your bank, and make sure you validate any requests from cold callers by hanging up and contacting your bank using the phone number on the back of your bank card.” Criminals call a business and pretend to be a bank employee, then trick the business’ staff member into giving them remote access to their device, their business’ online banking credentials and into authorising payments into criminals’ bank accounts.
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The number of attempted impersonation scams reported to Santander UK by its Corporate & Commercial Banking clients increased 100% during September, with over 200 clients known to have been targeted. Don’t allow anyone to remotely access your devices and never use a mobile app to authenticate a transaction you’ve not selected yourself in online banking, Santander warns.
Never click on a link, download an app, or open an attachment related to your organisation’s mobile or online banking in response to a call or SMS asking you to do so. Santander UK will never ask you to do this, the bank also adds in a handy guide for its account holders and customers online.
Never trust caller ID as contact numbers on phone calls and SMSs can be spoofed. Instead, validate all requests made through unsolicited contacts by calling your bank directly. Check the phone number using the phone number on the back of your bank card. Never use a phone number in an SMS message or which has been given to you by a cold caller.
