Noel Whittaker's Blog Last week was Scams Awareness Week, an educational initiative of the Australian Competition and Consumer Commission (ACCC) as part of their ongoing fight against scammers. Since the pandemic began, reports of scam victims have increased by 55%, and scammers have extracted over $500 million from Australians in just the last four months.
Don’t think you are too smart to be caught. My friend Roger, who is a retired businessman, went to Harvey Norman recently to get himself a new photocopier. His requirements were that it would be able to be connected wirelessly, and not cost an arm and a leg in supplies. After consultation he settled on a Canon.
He was having a frustrating time connecting it to his wi-fi when a notice popped up on his computer screen purporting to be from Canon. It noted he was having technical issues, and suggested he ring a certain number so Canon technicians could sort out the issue as part of the after-sales service.
It seemed genuine, so he rang the number. It was answered by a non-Australian person who said he was part of the Canon technical team and would need access to the computer to connect the photocopier. Roger tells me that after an hour of searching in his computer the alleged technician said that there would be a $980 service fee. Roger was horrified and said he would have to think about it – the response was that it must be paid immediately.
Roger hung up and called Harvey Norman to complain about the audacity of Canon to charge an installation fee that was more than the cost of the photocopier. They were shocked – and gave him the genuine Canon phone number to ring to complain. You guessed it: Canon were horrified as well, but did mention that this was becoming a common occurrence.
And it didn’t end there. Roger’s computer had been hacked, which meant he spent the next two weeks cancelling credit cards, changing passwords, and advising everybody he dealt with about what was, effectively, a break-in.
I think by now most of us are smart enough not to click on links in emails we don’t trust, but this takes scamming to a new level. It seems you now need to be wary about any phone numbers that pop up on your computer, and above all be extremely wary about who gets remote access to your computer.
Another scam that has been doing the rounds for months is the robo-call from “Nicole from the NBN” telling you that your NBN is to be terminated tomorrow and you need to press 1 to reactivate it. Having had a few of these calls, I have always wondered what the scammer can gain by asking you to press 1.
The ACCC tell me that pressing that button identifies you as a person who would be likely to accept other calls from scammers in the future.
So stay on your guard. And if you are paying money by bank transfer, be especially careful, because some scammers are now hacking into emails and changing the bank details of people you owe money to. When you receive a bill, you now need to confirm that the bank details on the invoice are the same as the details held by your bank for previous payments. If not, ring the supplier before payment.
And of course if it’s a new payee, make sure you ring the office, using a phone number you know to be genuine, not necessarily the one on the invoice, and confirm the account numbers are genuine.