Is your child a money mule?

Under-21s targeted by gangs on social media

NO one is safe from financial crooks but the under-21s are fast becoming the key target for fraudsters.

There has been a 24% increase in cases of young people falling victim to identity fraud during the past year, research reveals.

And there’s been a worrying 26% rise in the numbers of under-21s being persuaded, or duped, into laundering dirty cash by becoming a money mule for criminals.

The latest figures from Cifas, the UK’s leading fraud prevention service, also show that more than a third of victims of plastic payment card fraud on debit, credit or store cards were younger people.

Chief executive of Cifas Mike Haley said: “Our new figures are alarming to say the least. Young people are increasingly at risk of becoming victims of identity fraud, with little idea of how to protect themselves.

“We’re calling on banks in particular to ensure that they are providing young people with the necessary knowledge to prevent them falling victim to fraud – or becoming fraud perpetrators.”

About £236million was lost to scams in 2017, and financial firms such as Lloyds Banking Group have fraud teams working around the clock to protect customers from the everincreasing risk of financial fraud.

Their mule hunting team has frozen more than £1million from crooks trying to trick people into receiving and transferring cash.

Paul Davis, retail fraud director of Lloyds Banking Group, said: “We have sophisticated, multi-layered defences in place to help protect our customers from scammers.

“Fighting financial fraud is a concerted effort between the banks, the police and all of us – the more we all know about how to spot it, the safer we will be.”

We all need to be on our guard to try and keep ourselves safe from crooks who continually develop sophisticated scams that even the experts sometimes find hard to spot.

What is identity theft?

Crooks gather personal information about a person such as their name, address and date of birth, so they can impersonate them to get access to their financial accounts or to take out credit in their name.

They will use every trick in the book to get people to give them personal and financial information and to gain access to someone’s computer and financial accounts. Often the information they want can be found via social media sites. Becoming a victim of ID theft causes havoc and it can take months, sometimes years to get finances back on track. It can lead to people being unable to access credit or ending up being hit with extortionate rates of interest on the few products they do get offered.

What is a money mule?

This is where an individual allows their bank account to be used to move criminal funds, a form of money laundering which carries a maximum prison sentence of 14 years.

Social media is a key place for criminals to recruit money mules, with offers of a quick and easy way to make some cash. The consequences of getting caught moving fraudulent funds are serious.

Mules will be left with no bank account, a damaged credit score and that will mean they won’t be able to apply for a mortgage, loan or even a mobile phone contract in the future. Their actions could also land them in court.

Don’t Be Fooled is a partnership between Financial Fraud Action UK and Cifas to inform students and young people about the risks of giving out their bank details, to try and deter them from becoming money mules.

Don’t become a mule

■ No legitimate business will ever ask you to use your own bank account to transfer their money.

■ Be especially wary of these types of offers from people or companies based overseas – this will make it harder for you to find out if they are legitimate.

5 things you must do

■ Keep a regular eye on your credit report. You can then spot if anyone else is trying to access credit in your name and shut it down immediately.

■ Make sure anti-virus software is kept updated on all of your devices.

■ Use different passwords for each account – and choose them carefully, mixing upper and lower case letters, numbers and symbols.

■ Check your bank statement regularly for signs of fraudulent activity.

■ Only carry out financial transactions or access financial accounts over a secure internet connection – never on free wi-fi in cafes, on trains or in other public places.

Social media is a key place for criminals to recruit with offers of cash