Phone scam warning – I lost my life savings
Iopened my eyes as my phone suddenly started ringing on the bedside table.
Who’s calling at this hour? I wondered.
It was 8.30am and I didn’t often get calls on my landline.
‘Is this Margaret Taylor?’ a man’s voice boomed through the receiver.
I felt a current of panic. He sounded serious.
‘Yes…’ I replied carefully. ‘Who is this?’
‘This is Brian from Slingshot. A woman is downloading illegal pornographic material on your computer,’ he said. Horrified, I shot up in bed. Illegal pornography?
‘What do I do?’ I asked feeling frightened.
He instructed me to head over to my laptop and turn it on. Frazzled, I trotted over to my study area, trying to take in what the man was telling me. As he spoke faster and faster, his tone rising urgently, I started to stress out.
As I logged onto my computer, the man told me to press a few keys, giving him remote access to it.
‘Don’t worry,’ he assured me. ‘We’re going to stop these evil hackers.’
After he took control, numbers and graphs began flashing randomly before my eyes.
Not very computer savvy myself, I sat down on the lounge and let him do the work.
‘Now, I’m just going to change all your passwords,’ he explained.
He then gave me new random logins for my Facebook, email and bank accounts.
‘Okay, we’re going to clean this up,’ he said. ‘You can go about your day.’
Still on the phone, I started pottering around the house.
I was in the middle of a sewing job, so I kept him on the line as I worked.
Every so often, his voice would break the silence. ‘Ma’am, are you still there?’ ‘Yes, I’m here,’ I’d reply.
By 12pm, I had started to make lunch.
I’d already been on the phone for nearly four hours – and he still wasn’t done.
I hope everything is okay, I fretted.
An hour later, my flatmate Leanne, 47, came through the front door.
Seeing me sitting on the computer with the phone next to me, she gave me a puzzled look.
‘What are you doing?’ she asked.
Flustered, I tried to explain that a nice man was helping me stop someone illegally downloading porn on my laptop.
‘It’s a scam,’ she said loudly. ‘Shut it down now.’
Leanne then grabbed my phone, hung it up and told me to try and get back into my bank accounts.
When I did, I was absolutely stunned.
Every last cent of my savings was gone – and my credit card had been maxed out.
All up, the thieves had drained me of nearly $6000.
And they would have taken more if Leanne hadn’t walked in!
I felt sick.
Then, the scammer started calling me back. The third time he rang, I picked up.
‘How dare you? You stole all my money!’ I seethed, before slamming the receiver down.
I felt so silly – he’d kept me on the phone for five long hours as he’d squirrelled away my money.
I was a pensioner and had been saving for a rainy day.
Leanne and I then called the police, who transferred us to the fraud office.
They could see the
scammer had transferred the money into an account in the UK. Luckily, I had called them just in time.
I was told that after 12 hours, stolen money can be almost impossible to track.
It meant they would be able to get it all back.
Every few minutes, I’d check my account to see if the money had reappeared.
By day three, I was feeling desolate.
Finally, four days later, my life savings reappeared.
Crying tears of happiness, I called Leanne. ‘I’ve got it all back!’ I said. My bank also rang me to confirm the good news.
The kind lady suggested I write my experience down. So, I put pen to paper.
The story I am about to tell, is only one of the ways scammers get into your account… I began.
After telling a few of my friends at the bowls club, someone recommended I share my story with the elderly people in my community.
Soon after, I started speaking at care homes, retirement villages, Lions Clubs and other bowling clubs. The audience would stare at me with gaping mouths, horrified by how easy it was to be scammed. Afterwards, many elderly people would approach me and share their own dreadful stories.
One woman shyly confessed she had lost $50,000 to a man she met on a dating site.
Another man claimed he
was hypnotised over the phone to take cash out of an ATM and give it to a woman at the shops named ‘Shirley’.
All up, I’ve now spoken to hundreds of elderly residents.
Now I’m asking you to share this story with your family members, friends and neighbours.
I have learned an important lesson after almost losing my life savings.
I want others to know to never trust a stranger with
your personal information.
And never give anyone access to your computer.
Your private information is just that – private.
Don’t ruin your life over a silly mistake.