Part one of a three part series into fraud.
Fraudsters are increasingly using social engineering techniques to steal mobile phone numbers and intercept their owners’ online banking verification codes, according to an investigation published in the inaugural Australian print edition of SC Magazine.
With the country’s police forces too stretched to investigate and telcos unwilling to accept responsibility for the problem, Australia’s banks have been forced to wear the risk and cost of the fraud as they look to new methods of protecting online accounts.
The alarm
The scam is sophisticated, as one recent example illustrates.
George Craig*, a small business owner from Sydney’s Northern Beaches, received a call on his home phone from the Commonwealth Bank in mid-July.
He was told that his mortgage account had been accessed by fraudsters, who had funnelled out some $45,000. And his mobile phone – which hadn’t rang off the hook as it usually did during business hours – was used as a tool in the attack.
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