Bank of Ireland warned of an increase in bank impersonation scams in recent weeks.
According to the lender, reports of customers receiving fraudulent texts urging them to call scam phone lines rose in May.
In a case study, the bank’s fraud department describes an incident that happened to Tom, a man in his 50s.
He received a text appearing to come from Bank of Ireland, which asked him whether he recognised a transaction for €130 to a well-known company, instructing him to reply ‘No’ if he did not.
Concerned, the man replied immediately and received a follow up message urging him to call ‘Bank of Ireland’ using the number provided.
During the call, the “professionally sounding” fraudster created a sense of urgency, warning Tom that he must move his money to another account to protect it.
Tom followed the instructions and transferred €10,000 to an account that, unknown to him, was controlled by fraudsters.
Fraudsters “know how to create convincing conversations … and apply just enough pressure and pace to stop people hesitating in the moment”, said head of BOI’s fraud department Nicola Sadlier.
She said that the most effective way to protect yourself from such scams is a ‘zero trust’ approach.
In any doubt, Bank of Ireland recommends to call the bank directly using a trusted number from its official website or the back of the card.
The bank’s ‘TextChecker service’ was also designed to help with suspicious texts.
If a user gets a text that claims to be from Bank of Ireland but they are not sure if it’s genuine, they can verify it by copying the text, pasting it into a new message, adding the word ‘CHECK’ before the text and sending it to 50365.
