I've gotten to the stage where i don't answer my phone anymore unless its from someone that's on my contact list or it's a number I recognize. If they don't leave a message I block that number. I also think that when someone suggests you transfer money into another account that should immediately raise a red flag and you should hang up and not listen to anything they tell you no matter how convincing they are, and contact your bank directly. If they're still trying to convince you to transfer money, just tell them you can transfer the money into your other account with another bank to keep it safe, (just don't tell them which bank ) and hang up. I also don't do surveys from the bank i usually delete those, even though they genuinely look from my bank.

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I worry for my father as he gets older that he will be scammed.

The article does say how the person was scammed though. Did the person transfer funds from a Westpac bank account to a non Westpac bank account into a fraudsters account?

And did the persons sister get scammed in the following month?

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This past week or so I have had a scam operation trying very hard to get me. I made the mistake of leaving my mobile number and an email address on a web site that promised some interesting investment information. Within 30 seconds I had a phone call, during which I did some fast googling and realised the operation was a scam. I said I was no longer interested and hung up.

Ever since that I have been receiving multiple phone calls every day, sometimes 5 or 6 an hour. It was quickly obvious that the caller ID was spoofed. The calls appeared to originate from every state in Australia and from several other countries. None of these very professional sounding and obstinate callers wanted to accept that I didn't want to do business with them. Blocking their numbers achieved nothing because they kept changing them.

I set my phone to only accept calls from my contacts, but this screened out other wanted calls, so I used that restriction just after hours. Googling told me that this scam is almost impossible to stop. It seems to be run from countries where labour is very cheap, so they can just keep going ad infinitum. They never run out of phone numbers to use for spoofing.

Early on I tried to call one of them but had no answer. Later I had a genuine call from that number asking me why I had called. Yes, it was definitely genuine - a knockabout Aussie from interstate who was grateful for my explanation of spoofing.

If their calls are directed to voicemail, they never leave a message, but their call is revealed in the "Recents" information on iPhone. Quickly hanging up on their call doesn't seem to deter them.

I have found one method of reducing these nuisance calls: I answer but immediately hit the button to mute my microphone. The offender at the other end can hear nothing, not even any ambient noise. He spends a few minutes talking to himself before realising his time is being totally wasted.

Unfortunately, some victims of this scam are reported to have parted with their credit card number and been atrociously ripped off. Others have escaped that fate but have finished up changing their phone number and even smashing their phone.

Because the scam uses internet calling via SIP protocol, there is currently no way to be sure even which country is the call origin. The technique was first allowed to assist companies where, for example, calls were made from multiple points but calls in response were preferred to be received at central number. Thus all the outward calls had a caller ID of the central number.

A proper fix to prevent this scam would appear to be unlikely in the short term, would require cooperation between countries and major telcos and possibly will not be cheap. In the meantime, be very careful.

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This happened to my sister from CommBank, they were not successful as she doesn't have internet access, and the local branch stopped it when she went in. The pretext was that someone in the branch was committing fraud and they were trying to catch them. I don't have a local branch, so I guess saving an actual employees number would be a good idea, to verify they have called you.

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Somehow in this story it seems not all details have been included around how the transfer occurred. Did this lady give passwords? This is a great warning to people as the scammers are becoming very sophisticated however it's not Westpac at fault here. Don't trust anyone by phone/email and don't give any details.

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The only way to be sure is jot down the information and call the institution or department yourself with the numbers you find on their official website. Never take calls or sms messages for what they are.

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Thank you Hannah for speaking out. I think it is important for everyone to know how sophisticated these scams are becoming. I commend you wholeheartedly.

Your article did attract four excellent suggestions from Nellie Dyson but we shouldn't be hard on you Hannah, I reckon I might have found the scammers' pitch very plausible if the call appeared to come from Westpac and you could hear their "hold" music in the background! Of course it's easier to think of what you could have done in retrospect.

Thank you both, Hannah and Nellie, for your contributions.

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I change my mobile phone number once a year, and destroy my credit card and get a new one with a new number once a year. Is it a giant pain in the butt having to notify everyone of my new number? Yes, plus all the apps it's connected to? Yes again. But it stops all the stupid scam calls. And I never do ANY financial transactions on my phone. It's old school, but the internet has become a cesspit in the last decade. It's not to be trusted.

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It happended with me last month and I lost $22000 they told as you written in this comment I felt same as you are I reported cyber crime as well as my bank and ACCC. I didn't get any positive response but my bank still is investigating.

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Thanks for sharing your story.

Shame on you Westpac for telling her to "have a gin and chill etc",

I still would have gone to the police....

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I have a couple of comments concerning this story;

-why is this a bank issue? Irrespective of how convincing they are you still performed the transaction

-however after saying that if the transfer was to a Westpac account, which I suspect that it was. The issue that I would take up with the Bank is, how could a scammer open a Westpac account? All financial institutions are expected to have robust KYC policies, so how did they open an account? I too have been scammed, the situation was a little different but I ended up transferring AUD 850 to a NAB account. For a scam that was perpetrated o/seas how was this so? It is this issue that I think the regulators should be cracking down on.

Needless to say representation/queries to the NAB drew a blank. I just put the experience down to my own stupidity but I do believe that the bank should be held accountable to some extent.

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I tend to agree. I'm guessing the author either provided their password or did the transfer themselves to other accounts for 'safe holding'.

Also don't provide information to cold callers. If any organisation has contacted me they should already have all my information, I'm not providing my personal details. These become details the scammers might provide to the real organisation to try to claim they are me.

It is unfortunate that this is the world we're in and while I feel sorry for the author for having lost money, this doesn't appear to be the fault of the bank sitting idle anymore that it is the fault of the ATO or Telstra or Amazon who also have people impersonate them. Both Westpac and CBA have warnings about scams on the main page of their internet sites.

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This same exact thing has happened to my partner with CBA and they also hacked into their Netbank SMS system.

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Thanks Hannah for your detailed account. I wonder how the scammer knew your transactions?

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I wonder if they got in to her emails. Anyone who shops or pays bills online would have a decent paper trail of recent transactions just in their inbox.

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Best thing you can do when receiving a call from the bank is hang up and go to your nearest bank branch in person. If that's not possible the next best thing is to look on the back of your bank card and call that phone number, perhaps from someone else's phone if possible just in case yours is compromised. Don't ever give any personal details to anyone that calls you, only give when you call the bank. While scammers are getting better that advice mitigates 99% of scams including those in the article.

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Thank you for Sharing it. Yes it is disgusting this All happens.

Including the Banks staff poor training and slow if any communication. The Bank can be on the line for the bill at times and this may assist the result. Report in writing and over phone to Bank and Police ASAP. Along AFCA if not happy with banks poor handling and dragging on, ie 1 week limit. Consider using 2 Factor Authentication and setting up Alerts along with modest Daily Limit withdrawals.

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This happened to me on Friday at lunch, $20k, exact same story but Nab. Mentioned a transaction I done, told me my details where now shared with people in Russian and a no of transactions are pending.. have I set up a new phone contract etc. have to move my funds and close the account and my new account would b activated in 24hrs. Messages came from nab, number calling same as back of my card. Waiting 55mins trying to call Nab and report it. Can't get an update. Really upsetting.

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I Recieved a call from Nab fraud dep contact Number. Later found out it was a spoofing scam as mentioned in the Article similar story they told me my Accounts have been compromised, and needs to Open up an new account . They transfer funds in fast payment on phone I lost $17000 k still investigating I reported on ACSC ' crime watch and I'd watch scam watch and police still waiting.

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This exact thing happened to me and I lost a large amount of money. Filed a complaint at NAB but they responded they couldn't do anything for me. Filed a complaint at AFCA and they put an urgent request to NAB. NAB then offered me 1/2 of the amount as a goodwill offer. Does anyone know if I have a chance of getting the full amount back if I keep escalating this? Thanks

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The same thing happened to me yesterday. I received the text from ANZ number and said My ANZ account is compromised, I have to move the funds to new account. I transferred $20000 to the account under my name. Later I found the BSB number is Ubank. Is there any possibility to get a part of the money back? I'm single mother with three children, desperate to get the money back. At least some. Talked to ANZ fraud team, made a police report. What else?

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First rule of avoiding scams is to hang up and call your bank on a number you procured yourself. This has been a rule since banking became possible over the phone. It's in the freakin' documents you failed to read when you opened your account, it's on all the bank websites. You can't call yourself an "educated" person if you fail in this one absolutely simple rule. I have obeyed this rule and every time the person on the phone has been understanding of my skepticism and happy to wait for me to contact the bank or company or department directly. You and the scammer are the problem. The bank tells you not to fall for these scams and you happily hand over your money and expect the bank to compensate you for your stupid behavior. Maybe you're trying to run a scam on the bank!

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