A NSW woman nearly fell victim to a sophisticated financial fraud scheme after a scammer messaged pretending to be her adult daughter.
Mary*, who has asked to remain anonymous, received a WhatsApp message out of the blue on Tuesday, from a person with her daughter’s name claiming she had a new number.
That innocent text triggered a long-winded scam as the fake “daughter” convinced her to share bank account details. “I felt sick to my stomach,” the 70-year-old grandmother, exclusively tells 9Honey.
In the messages obtained by 9Honey, the scammer, who had the daughter’s first name and maiden name on WhatsApp, spent nearly two hours carefully extracting the Sydney grandmother’s personal information.
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Mary’s real daughter says the biggest red flag was the fact the fake number used her incorrect surname.
“It’s so bizarre, I don’t know how they did it. How did they know that I was my mum’s daughter?” she said to 9Honey.
I did it because it was my daughter and I’d do anything for her. I trust her.
“She thought it was her daughter. She trusts me and would do anything for me. And they just played on that vulnerability.”
In the lengthy text exchange, the scammer impersonated the woman’s daughter and tried to obtain her credit card details after claiming ‘she’ had no access to her own funds.
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