More and more victims of “spoofing”, a dreaded telephone scam

Mélanie Facchin 6:34 a.m., March 25, 2022

Beware of "spoofing", a new telephone scam that is claiming more and more victims in France.

The scammer calls you on your cell phone, showing your bank number.

He has plenty of personal information about you, puts you in trust and extracts your personal codes to block so-called fraudulent operations on your account.

A scam that can cost you several thousand euros.

This scam is very well established, carried out by professionals.

Anyone can fall into the trap, says Jean-Jacques Latour of the cybermalveillance.gouv.fr site.

"Scammers call their victims pretending to be their bank branch, sometimes using their bank's customer service number," he explains.

"They make them believe that they are in the process of spotting a fraud carried out on their bank account and pretend that they are going to send them codes for canceling these transactions in order to be able to stop the fraud", continues Jean-Jacques Latour.

Except that it is not cancellation codes that they send to their victims, "but purchase codes that they are doing with credit cards on sites often located abroad".

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“I lost 4000 euros”

These scammers are often very well informed about you: "They already know your name, your first name, your address, your telephone number", details this specialist in cybercrime.

"It will give you the confidence to be able to fall into their trap," he says.

Jean-Jacques Latour, who finds it difficult to estimate the number of victims, at least several dozen per month according to him, specifies that this phenomenon affects "all of France and that it can only increase in the months which are coming".

Two months ago, Nathalie, a 58-year-old from Strasbourg, was trapped.

That day, she receives a call on her cell phone.

A man introduces himself as a consultant to his bank and immediately puts her at ease.

"He gave me the name of my adviser, my maiden name, my date of birth," she recalls.

"And he said to me: "There is a fraud on your account so I invite you to open the application of your bank". He then encourages Nathalie to enter her personal codes and in three quarters of an hour, he empties My husband's Livret A. "I lost 4,000 euros" she sighs, still very shocked by this misadventure.

A dozen complaints a day in Strasbourg

Nathalie is obviously far from being the only one to have been scammed.

Aurore Champeau, head of the fraud brigade at the Strasbourg central police station, has been registering around ten complaints every day for several months.

The damage can amount to "a few hundred euros", details the policewoman.

"But it can go up to 10,000 or 15,000 euros" she warns.

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So how do you avoid getting scammed?

"There is a golden rule: you never entrust your personal codes", insists Aurore Champeau.

"If it's really your banker, he won't ask you for them, and besides, he doesn't need them. From the moment you are asked for your codes, it's a scam " she insists.

If you do give your personal codes, know that your bank will consider you responsible and therefore will not reimburse you.

All you have to do then is file a complaint for fraud.