As access to online banking services continues to grow, so does the need to protect yourself against the prevalence of online banking fraud.
The virtual world has made life more convenient and places across the world more accessible. But it can leave you more vulnerable to cybercrime, resulting in you losing your hard-earned money.
Yolande Steyn, Head of Innovation at FNB unpacks the latest online banking scams that you should be aware of.
Flight purchase debit – with this scam you receive an SMS informing you of a flight purchase debited to your account. Fraudsters will request you to click a link in the SMS to revise the transaction. This will direct you to a fake banking website, which will request you to ‘Update and Confirm Details’ on your screen.
Social media scams – beware of fraudsters pretending to represent major banks on social media channels such as Facebook, Twitter, LinkedIn or WhatsApp. Banks will never ask for your credit or cheque card, account number, online banking login details or password or One Time PIN (OTP) on social media platforms.
Change of banking details – you will receive a fake email, claiming to be one of your suppliers asking you to update your banking details. Beware of this even if it is on the supplier’s letterhead. Contact your supplier from your contact list and not the one on the fraudulent letter. Speak to someone you know at the supplier to confirm the change in banking details.
Copy of payment notification – In this scam, you will receive an email requesting you to open a copy of your payment notification. You will then be prompted to log in through the email attachment, which will redirect you to a fake bank account.
Fishing and smishing scams –Instead of being lured to a fake website via email, you receive a call or SMS, where the individual pretends to be from a financial institution or another company and gets you to disclose personal information such as your ID number, address, account number, username, login details, password, and PIN.
OTP Email Fraud – when fraudsters get access to your email accounts they produce fake login sites that look like Gmail or Yahoo, making it possible to access to your emails (statements, personal communications) and this helps them to build a social profile of you.
OTP SIM Swop Fraud – once criminals are in possession of your username and password, they can easily access your accounts on Online Banking. They can also contact your service provider to do a sim swap.
Lesson: banks will never ask for your username, password or PIN in an email, SMS, social media or phone call. “Never select a link to a bank’s website that was sent via email. Always type in FNB’s web address,” concludes Steyn.
Tips to stay cyber safe:
- Never click on links in emails. Your bank will never ask you to click on a link
- If someone calls and pretends to be from a reputable company, be wary if they start asking for information that is personal. Rather, hang up and call the company on any of its official numbers to verify the call.
- Your username and password for banking, email and other websites should always be different.
- Regularly change passwords and PIN numbers.
Source: FNB
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