en
The internet has made our life easier and better than ever. However, scammers and fraudsters are exploiting the lack of internet-protection knowledge of internet users, to deceive innocent people. These scams can cause the victim financial loss and emotional distress.
Preparing yourself with knowledge of scams and fraud will help minimise these risks. You need to be cautious with anything present on the internet or anyone contacting you that you have never met in person.
There are many types of scams and fraud that are related to sending money. And you can read more information on the Scamwatch website.
Scammers will try to build the relationship with you using social channels such as facebook, twitter, etc or dating apps. You have not ever meet the person in the real life. After successfully building trust with you, they will try to convince you to send them money for emergency issues or family problems.
Scammers use emails, text messages and phone calls to pretend to be from a known organisation, to access to your personal identity information or to convince you to send them money.
These emails and text messages normally have links or attachments that you can click on to enter your personal information, or download malicious software onto your devices so they can remotely access your computer.
Scammers try to steal business email account login information to access their emails. When a business’s email account is compromised they use it to request payments to be sent to a different bank account that belongs to a scammer. This is normally only detected when customers claim they have already paid for an invoice but the genuine business has not received it.
Scammers contact you by phone or email pretending to be technical support staff from a bank or a phone/internet company. They may tell that you have an IT issue and request to remotely access to your computer to determine the issue. They may also convince you to buy software to fix the issue that can steal your personal information and/or transfer money from your bank account.
Scammers offer you an inheritance, a lottery winning, a parcel containing high-value assets such as jewellery, gold, etc. or a share of a large sum of money in return for paying an upfront fee to claim it.
Scammers claim to be a charity that asks for donations. The money goes to a scammer’s bank account. This type of scams normally happens during disasters or when there is a crisis.
Scammers pretend to be a broker or a professional financial planner and propose a very attractive investment plan. They can try to either convince you to hand over your personal information, or money to invest where you will lose your entire investment.