How 'money mules' are being used to scam hundreds of thousands of dollars from bank accounts | 7.30
HTML-код
- Опубликовано: 27 июн 2024
- A money mule is a person whose account is used to transfer illegally acquired funds through the banking system and out of the reach of law enforcement.
Most money mule accounts are either created using stolen identities, or set up legitimately by people who are recruited to transfer money, move it offshore, withdraw it or convert it to cryptocurrency, usually for a commission.
Over a four-hour phone call, scammers gained access to Jenny's computer and transferred $300,000 out of her account. By the time she alerted the bank, it was too late. Subscribe: ab.co/3yqPOZ5 Read more here: www.abc.net.au/news/2023-05-2...
ABC News In-depth takes you deeper on the big stories, with long-form journalism from Four Corners, Foreign Correspondent, Australian Story, Planet America and more, and explainers from ABC News Video Lab.
Watch more ABC News content ad-free on ABC iview: ab.co/2OB7Mk1
For more from ABC News, click here: ab.co/2kxYCZY
Get breaking news and livestreams from our ABC News channel: / newsonabc
Like ABC News on Facebook: / abcnews.au
Follow ABC News on Instagram: / abcnews_au
Follow ABC News on Twitter: / abcnews
Note: In most cases, our captions are auto-generated.
#ABCNewsIndepth #ABCNewsAustralia
The banks will never ring you and ask for personal info they have already got on their system.NEVER give anyone remote access to your device.
NEVER DEAL WITH ANYONE FINANCIALLY BY PHONE! NEVER CLICK ON LINKS IN EMAILS YOU DID NOT INITIATE! Two very simple rules that everyone needs to learn. If someone wants you to do something financial CHECK WITH YOUR FINANCIUAL INSTITUTION INDEPENDANTLY. NEVER ALLOW ANYONE ACCESS OVER THE INTERNET TO YOUR COMPUTER. Learn these things or suffer the consequences. Treat every contact as if it is a scam until you can prove otherwise.
My bank has never called me. Not once in decades has any bank called me.
If they did, I'd hang up and call them back. It's so simple.
100% and letting them remotely install software.....massive massive red flag, just hang up.
The poor couple. Imagine how painful it would be to have your entire retirement savings stolen by a scam like this. Sure they should have known better but it's still very sad. I hope banks can find new ways to prevent scams like these.
The only thing the banks could do is restrict our access to our own money. That would cause even more outrage.
These scams are not sophisticated so don't let the cops or the banks tell you otherwise. Please educate yourselves and tell your family about these refund, gift card tech support scams. Once you know their game they are so easy to spot
You are right, unfortunately. It's surprising how naïve people can be.
Of course, it’s always the best to bulletproof yourself from a scam
It’s so simple people , any calls you hang up and ring the real business and ask them , this day in age it’s hard to feel sorry for people who can not follow this simple rule
Just assume everyone is out to scam you and make them prove otherwise...that's the best way...just doubt everyone.
"Everybody should have confidence that when they put money in the bank, it's going to stay there"
YOU LITERALLY GAVE SOMEONE ACCESS TO YOUR MONEY, LADY!
Everyone should talk to their bank about fraud protections. My bank won’t let a transaction go through if it’s in China, for example. And we have a 500 dollar daily spending limit. It can be inconvenient to call the bank for large purchases, but rather that.
Really China ? It’s India you need to worry about
@@kaynefryday6637
I’ve never attempted to buy anything made in India, so I wouldn’t know if they stop those.
Isn't that racist though? I think rules like that can cause upticks in Asian hate crimes.
@@kaynefryday6637lol soo true
Why don't banks just set up what "authenticator" apps do for anything over a particular amount? People could get an instant sms asking if they made the transaction and pin in a simple two digit number to verify they would like the transaction to take place. Also... funny how just below in the comments there's one of those scam message lines from "Sylvester Ben".
They have that. Often the scammers will ask you for the code... and idiots will hand it over.
I think the bank was sending her code's for each transaction and she just read them out to the scammer.
I feel bad for them and that's a tonne of money for retirement but come on, they ran a business and left themselves wide open with no locks on their account for international transactions and then let remote software get installed? No red flags there? Not the banks fault here unfortunately.
It's not their fault they were scammed, it was the scammers fault.
You can't protect some people from themselves
It was a quality scam . Many of us would panic . The remote access wouldn't fly with a lot of folk , as the bank can do that at their end . I don't think there's anyone who doesn't know of someone who's been scammed . The remote access request works well on older people , and those I know of who granted it were in their seventies and eighties . As someone here said , lock transactions , but with access they can be unlocked in front of your eyes . This couple have a beautiful house .
Banks call it “friendly fraud” which is asinine in itself, but you’re out of luck to add injury to insult.
No, if you opened your wallet and a thief took out some cash, it's not the fault of the wallet manufacturer.
For an obviously educated woman, installing remote access software for some guy on the phone was a naive thing to do.
If i was a betting man, i would say that bloke acting as a money mule, knew what he was doing and at the very least knew that his activities were illegal.. He was transferring large sums of money and allowed to keep 5% from the goodness of their hearts...Come on, give me a break.
"5% commission, I was just providing a service." I GOT QUESTIONS!
What the hell is Interpol for if not for these bringing international crimes to justice? I don’t understand this “there’s nothing we can do business.”
Your money is safe in the bank unless you give your personal details to a stranger over the phone.
Imagine the scam explosion if banks compensated you when you give someone access to your bank account enabling them to transfer money. I would be on this straight away send money to friends overseas and rock up to the bank and say hey where is my refund? Banks says what happened explain the above and what the bank just says here you go we've just topped you up with 300K
Honestly I felt bad for the old couple. But I think not taking responsibility for their actions and place squarely the blame on their bank will mean they are very likely to be scammed again.
How could they of taken responsibility for the first few unauthorised transactions which started it all?
The bank does not hold your money for free. They charge you to manage those funds. They have a level of ethical (not moral) responsibility to ensure your money s protected.
@@tironibusmaximus6100very good, a level of care. and the level of care they are demanding exceeds what the bank can provide. and I will argue you also should have a level of care over your own money. should you not?
@@somerandomfella By using proper Internet security software. Practically ALL decent internet security today if set up correctly will alert you if any of your information ends up on the dark web. If you use a computer and the internet you have at least some obligation as to what of your information to share and with whom.
But given your inability to form a proper sentence it might be too much to ask.
@@tironibusmaximus6100 I'm definitely not a cheerleader for banks but putting ALL the responsibility on them in this day and age is frankly outrageous. If that was to ever become mandated then I think the banks would be left with no other recourse then to force their users to use proper internet security or else bank elsewhere.
many people should not have a landlines and know not to answer unknown numbers and they should isolate their savings accounts away from their own debit accounts
Just never pick up the landline/internet phone. You can check later. Mobile phones are the worst.
How can I make sure as a supplier that my customer is a genuine one or he might be involved in a mule fraud. Any tips?
It's good to see that Doctors also get ripped off, & it's not just the poor, fancy paying over $100 to just see a Doctor for 2 minutes!
I don’t know about in Australia but in America ATM machines have cameras that show the face of the person using the machine.
A friend of mine lost $500k in 2019 through a scheme: Someone coerced him to invest property development overseas, by setting him up a company in Australia making him director, then used his company as a guarantor for a $500k loan then disappeared - The borrower is the scammer. The lender was a private company who then went to the guarantor for retrieval of the loan.
But if it was a ltd company, he shouldn't be personally liable, no? How did he lose the money? Did he personally go guarantor for the $500k loan? (Sorry to hear this happened)
@@skullsaintdead The company was guarantor but he was or is (more about this in a minute) sole director using his personal assets/properties as the company’s assets, hence, the assets were not protected under the so called company’s law. The scammer took my friend to their own accountant to setup this “phantom” company, they knew if they went to the big four banks to take out the loan they would be caught so they went to a private lender, to this date I still have doubts about this lender might having a connection with this scammer. Though phantom company but it was or is registered still with ASIC, very hard to get rid off ‘coz ASIC just simply won’t deregister until properly declared (You can imagine all the paper works about company incomes/expenses, etc, real mess). I tried to help and refer to police but no luck they said my friend legally signed papers, contracts, etc.
People need to value their money more and just hand over their hard earned money to someone they never met in person. Business transactions should always be done in person and in writing on physical paper. Doing anything other than that you’re setting yourself up for a scam.
its not hard to not give anyone you're information, noone asks for these details
Neither the victim's banks nor the victims are responsible. The scammers and the companies that facilitate the scams need to be tracked down and prosecuted. This includes the software developers of the apps the scammers use, the companies allowing the scammers to make millions of scam calls each day, and the foreign banks facilitating the scams. A foreign bank that was used in a scam should be suspended from Swift so it cannot operate international banking. As the scamming operations are probably only a minor part of that bank's operations this would incentivise those banks to cleanout the scammers.
The best way to defend against these scams is having multiple bank accounts. I keep all my savings with CommBank in an offline ATM-Only card account.
Set up a second account with Westpac and keep your funds for running expenses (like $1K) for transferring money online out to people. That way, you can limit your liability for scams like this.
Never keep a ton of cash in the checking always turn off overdraft from your savings account since most of the scams will keep your card when you use it which gives them access to your checking always lock the cards when not in use
Mojib knew exactly what he was doing!!
I think so too. He first was a victim of scam then decided to become a villain to make up for his loss😂😂😂
How can you conduct a business transaction for months without ever meeting the person in person?
If the elderly gentleman is in Australia, why is he contacting a US company to recover his money? Shouldn’t he be contacting the bank or local authorities?
It is not unusual for scam victims to be victimized even further by the same scammer or group of scammers. You got the initial scammer who steals their money they have another set of scammers pretending to help them recover their money.
There’s no such thing as a dream job where you never meet your employer and everything is only done through emails, text and phone calls.
its funny that you can do 1000's of dollars in faster payments without it coming up as suspicious, and then you can't get it back, but can do 1000's of dollars credit card spend, and say you didn't spend it and get the transactions reversed.
So sad! Stop trusting Authority, especially someone who calls you!
I legit thought the beginning of this was an advertisement.
what a peaceful nation, India.
This should have been addressed when Modi was here recently. Our banks all have all outsourced to India so data breaches are inevitable. I’m suprised there has not been a class action against the banks.
I feel sorry for her but it’s not the bank’s fault
Also bank is not doing really good jobs protecting consumer. They don’t care. When people go to deposit on the same account, they don’t give out flyers or scam.
you gave them full access to your computer, customers should not have to pay for that
I don’t think you can tell where the scams are coming from
Valuable information. It only depends on our wisdom. We should not become prey. We should be greedy
I think my banks wouldn't let these scams through (mebank, Macquarie) they seem to be careful with unusual transactions. Maybe i am wrong?
Scams can happen anywhere anytime. Be alert.
This is nothing, wait to see what happens with Generative AI and Scammers. No matter how smart or decent you are you can be got.
Used my st George card in a Bendigo bank ATM, immediately got a text from someone claiming to be st George said that my details needed to be updated and verified....go with your gut feelings.
Never use anydesk to save yourself
The old lady goofed. Blaming the bank when we all know for years now to be careful of scams . I hate to be on the side of a big bank creaming off profits but this is on her
How is it that this lady had 300k and i cant even pay a 450 dollar rent god can guve and take away.
I feel bad for them but it really wasn't that sophisticated. It was just your standard remote access bank scam. The one difference being they had access to leaked credit card numbers and were able to charge fraudulent amounts ot the card which apparently was enough to get her guard down.
they can get away if under $500.
Comm bank don't care about their customers. As long as they are getting there fees
Super rich aussies are losing a bit of pocket change. Most aussies can't even DREAM to live where they do 😅
so a industrial chemist is not smarty enough to understand what a mule is
Iso 20022 coins silver and gold in that order 💪🏿💪🏿💰💰💲💲
What.. no... the bank is not to blame, they are not there to hold your hand and wipe your butt. I am sick of people crying that we need to live in a nanny nation. Part of being an adult is taking responsibility for your own actions. She got scammed, she has to live with that, her fault.
If someone calls you and claims to be from your bank get their name, hang up, call your bank using the phone number from their website, your card or your statements. If they are a scammer they will just hang up if you say you will call them back. Do this from a mobile so they can't keep the line active.
You can always ask for your bank details, tfn, address.. if you know what your last transaction was ask the bank how much it was. Scammers will just hang up on you.
God please don't victim blame like that. Humans, especially older ones who didn't grow up with the internet, aren't hardwired to know all the signs of a scam. Banks having things set up against this stuff is the mature thing to do as a country because expecting every single person to just know all the ways to protect themselves from is just a great way to ensure your country keeps getting scammed and losing money from it's economy. Don't forget that most scammers target older people specifically because they know those kind of people are more likely to fall for it. Telling all the miillions of people who could potentially get scammed to just be more responsible completely ignores the reality that most of those people aren't going to hear your message, it is the banks duty to ensure things are in place to protect the people who don't even realise they need protection, that's what the point of a country is
Well said. Seems today these "victims" throw logic out the window. Banks make so much effort since forever to be contactable even if you have to wait, yet all that is forgotten when the phone rings and a non Australian accent is at the other end, even with all this awareness in media and surely her friends have spoken about reading it somewhere! Her fault 100%. Feel bad but made the bed to lie in it.
@@shinobix4925 She's an adult. Ignorance is no excuse, it's just the same as crime. You're responsible for your own actions. My mother is older than the woman in the video, when she gets a suspicious email or message she calls me or my brother.
Everybody knows there's scams going around, there's warnings regularly, there's news stories, there's warnings on bank websites.. they even send emails saying things like, "We will never call you".
Yes, it's her fault. She should have known better but wasn't paying attention the hundreds or thousands of times the warnings were issued in her presence.
Many of the scams that go around today began in the POST.. before the internet, before her generation, her mother would have received them.
They are not hardwired to be stupid, blind or ignorant. She has the same brain everyone else does. Older people don't suddenly become brain damaged or stupid.
I do not want to live in a nanny-police nation because she's too stupid to listen to people when they tell her that scams exist. She's an adult, she has the internet, she has a phone, she has everything needed to educate herself.
Ignorance is no excuse. It is her job to mind her own life, business, bank accounts and so on. If she can't do that then she needs a carer. She's capable, it's her problem if she's not willing.
No. If there is a problem with your account it will be noted in bank's computer system. No need to ask their name. The more you talk the easier they get a voiceprint on you which they can then use to fraud more. I don't answer numbers I don't recognize. If it is real they will leave a message. If it is banking/financial I never call back the message number. I look up the number online. So many scams. Beware
@@shinobix4925 Someone has to be financially responsible, and if you give out your details, allow remote access to your PC, or launder hundreds of thousands of dollars through your account, then that person is you.
But let’s keep letting more of em in Australia. Penny Wongs already got the red carpet waiting to be rolled out! 😏
Better off to have a crypto account. If the big4 cannot guarnatee safety of your payments and the return of a wrong payment there is no use in putting up with their fees and low interest. Use crypto. Be your own bank.
All you need to say to them is
Terry Maki Choote,
and they will hang up trust me .
jenny still lives in a beautiful suburban mansion, while the rest of us will never own a tiny flat let alone a house with multiple rooms and a yard
And her husband spent a small fortune on education and spent year's studying to become a Dr.
Whilst I understand your sentiment and the perceived negligence of a wealthy grandmother, we are also talking about the negligence of the biggest bank in Australia...
Don't forget who lost their money and who reported billions in profits this quarter.
The banks in Australian's don't really care about this issue, they blame customers for it when is the banks' responsibility to make sure that people's money are safe and secured.
im sorry but if you lose your money because you believe a caller on the phone you dont deserve your money back. - Otherwise our banks would go bankrupt because there's alot of idiots out there that do this crap.
India !
The very first thing she says is the most important
NEVER TRUST A BANK
The bank didn’t steal her money. She practically gave it to a scammer
Indian nationals. How surprising. Didn’t we have the Indian PM here last week and treat him like a rockstar? India the country that’s closely aligned to Russia oh and the country our PM thinks is the best thing since slice bread.
They discussed graffiti vandalism on Hindu temples and avoided Russia and scamming
only greedy people get stung
The Banks should be the ones taking responsibility
The banks would go out of business if they took responsibility every time someone did something like this, not to mention invite people to commit fraud and play victim.
I have no love of the banks, but we should be chasing and punishing the actual criminals.
Can't fault the business for the stupidity of the customer, what kind of world would we live in?
If you have thousand of dollar landed in your account you withdraw and give someone ? You are part of monies loundring activity
While ever there are gullible people there will be scammers