Virgin boss nearly duped by conman in £4 million scam
Sir Richard Branson has revealed he considered handing over £4 million to a conman posing as Defence Secretary Sir Michael Fallon.
The self-made billionaire wrote on his Virgin blog yesterday about how he was nearly duped in an elaborate scam six months ago, during which he was asked to pay a lump sum towards a terrorist ransom.
The 67-year-old told how he was contacted by a person impersonating Sir Michael via a note he believed was written on official government paper.
Sir Richard phoned the number on the note and the man he thought was the Defence Secretary asked for help to free a British diplomat who had been allegedly kidnapped.
The Virgin boss was told how British laws stopped any ransom payouts and that Sir Richard would receive the money he contributed back.
“I called Sir Michael on the number given,” Sir Richard wrote. “He told me it was an incredibly sensitive matter and that he wanted to be sure there was nobody else in the room whilst I talked to him.
“He asked that we speak in strict confidence and said that a British diplomat had been kidnapped and was being held by terrorists. He told me that British laws prevented the government from paying out ransoms, which he normally completely concurred with.
“But he said on this occasion there was a particular, very sensitive, reason why they had to get this diplomat back, so they were extremely confidentially asking a syndicate of British businesspersons to step in. I was asked to contribute $5m (£4m) of the ransom money.”
Sir Richard said he had then become sceptical about the request. The business magnate had recently been unwittingly part of a separate scam in which a US friend had been duped out of £1.5m by a Branson impersonator.
“I needed to be absolutely certain that this wasn’t such an event, and that he was who he said he was,” Sir Richard said. “He said he fully understood and that I should send one of my senior team over to his department at Whitehall to have a quiet word with his secretary. He said that she was the only other person who knew about it and that if we said the code word ‘Davenport’, she would affirm it was for real.”
Sir Richard called Downing Street and spoke to Sir Michael’s secretary, who assured him the Conservative minister had not spoken to him and no-one had been kidnapped.
He subsequently warned about the rise of fake ad scams and urged others to be vigilant.
“He asked that we speak in strict confidence and said that a British diplomat had been kidnapped and was being held by terrorists”
RICHARD BRANSON