Chasing a Ghost

Dear Scott,

Just before Covid hit, I paid a $3,000 deposit for a new fence. Then Covid hit, and everything stopped. After restrictions were lifted we got in contact with the fencer and he started all the excuses under the sun about why he wasn’t able to start the job. He finally admitted he was not going to do it. We asked for our deposit back, we still have not got it. We have told him we will take the matter to small claims court but this has made no difference to him. The trouble is we only have his first name, his bank account details, his phone number and his company name. What can I do?

Danielle

Hi Danielle,

You can do an ASIC search on his company name and find his registered details, and with that possibly take him to a small claims tribunal (like VCAT in Victoria).

So by all means, give it a go.

Having said that, he sounds like a crook. And it also sounds like this isn’t his first rodeo. So you could end up spending a lot of time, energy and emotion chasing this guy … and you still may never get the money back.

Look, I don’t want to sound too woo-woo, but sometimes you just have to let these things go …

So if it were me, I’d put that energy into finding a good tradie who’ll build you a good fence.

(And know that, one day, that guy’s going to get his nuts nailed to a fence.)

Scott.

Why ING Sucks

Fiona is a young high school maths teacher who has a lot on her mind.

She’s knee deep in planning her wedding, so her head is full with nuptial numbers:

The guest list, her wedding dress, flowers, bridesmaid dresses … bridesmaids.

One afternoon recently her phone rang.

It was a private number.

As with most people, Fiona’s reflex was to ignore it and let it go to voicemail, but then she remembered she was expecting a call from a supplier about the wedding, so she answered.

Turns out it was Telstra.

“The Telstra rep seemed to know all my details, and they ran me through the privacy stuff. Then they told me that my internet server had been compromised and that I was vulnerable to hackers”, she told me.

Fiona was a little suspicious … but the rep directed her to a Telstra website and asked her to put in her IP address. Sure enough it showed that she had in fact been hacked.

“O.M.G!”

From there, she was directed to open her emails, and then her ING banking app.

The Telstra employee (who had given Fiona her Telstra employee ID for verification purposes) asked her to write down a long series of numbers that she would need to give to the technician that would be visiting her house the next day and reset her internet.

While Fiona was busy writing down numbers, her fiancé arrived home from work and went to the study to do some banking. A few moments later he stormed out and to the lounge room and waved his ING app in her face.

The $20,000 they’d saved up in their ING account to pay for their wedding?

Gone.

Fiona had in fact been talking to a scammer all this time.

“Please make me look silly to your readers,” Fiona pleaded as she told me her story. “Because I am silly. I thought that these scams only happened to Boomers!”

Yet here’s what got my goat:

The scammers hit her account every 30 seconds, each time taking random amounts:

$546, $990, $7.50, $1,000, $99.

And they kept smashing the account until all $20,000 was drained.

Yet get this: the account name the money was going to was spelt “Drothy”.

OH COME ON!

We’re not in Kansas anymore, ING!

Grab the Tin Man and Toto and go bite these buggers!

Seriously, you’d think that Australia’s fifth largest bank – which trousered $549 million in profits after tax last year – would have tipped even just a little bit of that dough into having the most basic banking safety features … like, say, a trigger that detects when a customer is potentially getting scammed and puts a temporary lock on the account?

Nope.

Yet it gets worse.

After a lot of back and forth and tears from Fiona, ING agreed to pay her half the money back.

Half?

That makes absolutely no sense to me.

Either ING believes it’s not their problem, in which case they would tell her (politely) to go jump. Or they admit they should have detected the fraud and pay the money back.

So which is it?

You can’t get half up the duff, Drothy!

In fact, ING’s behaviour is depressingly very bank-like:

“When customers get scammed, it’s a lottery if they get reimbursed by their bank. Sometimes it’s 50%, sometimes it’s 75%, sometimes we find they get nothing”, says Gerard Brody from the Consumer Action Law Centre.

ING’s logo is a lion, which is kind of apt.

In The Wizard of Oz the cowardly lion is given a dish of courage to drink, which instantly transforms him and allows him to protect Dorothy.

Time to lick the bowl, ING.

You’re Australia’s most recommended bank. Start acting like it.

And if, dear reader, you’re thinking “There’s no way I would have fallen for a Telstra scam”, then you really need to read the following question and see how you would have fared …

Tread Your Own Path!

A Scammer Stole Our Family Home!

Hi Scott,

My husband and I have seven kids, aged from one to 13. Five weeks ago we finally took the plunge and bought a big family home!

After the deal was done, our solicitor, Jenny, called and directed us to pay our deposit of $165,000 to the trust account. Then at 6:47am the next morning Jenny emailed us with a ‘correction’ to that account. I thought that was a bit weird, so I emailed back to confirm. Jenny came back almost immediately. All good.

So my husband took the morning off work and went to the bank to wire the money to the account. He paid the $35 bank transfer fee and made sure the teller checked and rechecked the numbers. That night we celebrated!

Then, two days ago, Jenny called to ask us where the deposit money was! Unbeknownst to her, hackers had taken over her computer and communicated with us from her exact email address, posing as her, using her exact language!

So we immediately called the police. They did an investigation and found that the scammer is in Kenya, so it was out of their jurisdiction. They also told us that Interpol doesn’t deal with ‘small amounts’. “There’s nothing you can do”, the police told us.

We have spent hours on the phone to our bank. They have given us $5,000 on the proviso that we drop any action against them. To say we are gutted is an understatement. Please alert all your readers to the risk of hackers accessing online transactions.

Nathan and Natalie

Hi Guys,

My heart absolutely breaks for you.

Here’s what you learned the hard way … that most people don’t know:

When you transfer money your bank always asks for the name of the account that you’re transferring the money to. Logically, you’d think that’s so their systems match and verify the account name.

But they don’t.

You could write ‘IMA BANK ROBBER’ in the account name and it’d still go through.

(Or ‘Drothy’, take your pick.)

Yet hang on, don’t the banks invest billions of dollars a year into cutting-edge artificial intelligence so they can cross-sell you credit cards every time you log on? Surely matching the account name would be a pretty basic code for them to add on?

Well, it turns out it is, and it works!

Five years ago banks in the Netherlands introduced account name checking and it reduced this type of fraud by a staggering 81 per cent.

So … why aren’t our banks doing it?

Well it seems it’s just not a priority for them.

But it is for me.

Nathan and Natalie, let’s make a ruckus this week, and see what happens.

Stay tuned.

Scott.

Scammers Got the Lot

Hi Scott,

My daughter recently clicked on a text message from scammers saying they were from ANZ. She entered her login details and gave the scammers full access to her account. I’m worried about what will happen next. I’ve googled it a bit and have seen that scammers can change your postal address and steal your identity. Is there anything my husband and I can do to help her work through this and protect her from what they might do with her info?

Kellie

Hi Kellie,

Grab your phone. Grab your daughter. Dial 1800 595 160.

That’s the number for IDCARE, Australia’s national identity and cyber support service. Their hotline is manned by specialist identity and cybersecurity counsellors who will give your daughter free advice.

Tell your daughter not to beat herself up too much. These things happen a lot. In fact, 2.1 million Aussies experienced one or more types of personal fraud in 2021, according to the Australian Bureau of Statistics (ABS). Yet, shockingly, only half of those who experienced a scam said they reported it to an authority.

Don’t let them get away with it!

Scott.

I got scammed

So this is kind of humiliating, but I have a confession:

A few weeks ago I got scammed … and it ended up costing me $5,000.

The toughest part to swallow?

It was kind of my own fault.

See, I have a longstanding rule of never reading anything that’s written about me. I don’t Google myself. I’m almost never on social media. Heck, I don’t even manage to read all my emails (luckily I have my long-suffering editor to help go through them).

In other words, I was a sitting duck just waiting to get scammed.

Here’s what happened:

A bloke set up a Barefoot Investor beginners Facebook group – that I knew nothing about – and it quickly grew to almost 100,000 people.

This group served as his primary marketing database.

Then he set up a website called Barefoot Budgets that looked and felt like my own Barefoot website.

He charged people $120 a year to access it.

Yet, more worryingly, he was recommending that his ‘Barefoot Beginners’ speculate on risky crypto and foreign exchange apps, because he was getting kickbacks from them.

Shockingly, this was going on for a couple of YEARS.

So, while old Scotty Boy was happily bouncing along on the tractor slashing grass, this dude was making hay while the sun shined!

The first I heard about it was when someone told me they wanted a refund.

“For what?!” I grunted.

Then I Googled ‘Barefoot Budgets’.

What the slash?!

The first thing I did was pay for a membership to Barefoot Budgets. (When the sign-up form asked me “How did you hear about Barefoot Investor?” I replied, “Because I bloody wrote it!”).

The second thing I did was call my lawyer.

Here’s you: “Okay, Barefoot, it sucks to be you, but surely this doesn’t really apply to me.”

Here’s me: “Oh yes it does.”

If you’re reading this you are, statistically, one of the wealthiest people on the planet … and to 90% of the world you’re rich, and a juicy target.

That explains why self-reported losses from cybercrime hit more than $33 billion last year. And also why calls to the Government’s Australian Cyber Security Hotline (1300 292 371) surged 300% last year.

So, here’s what you should do:

First, turn on ‘multi-factor authentication’ for all your accounts. (Google it.)

Second, use a password manager. (I use Dashlane to securely store my passwords.)

Third, pay for a virtual private network (VPN). (I use ExpressVPN — for $100 a year it’s good insurance.)

Finally, learn the lesson from me: keep your eyes open, especially when it comes to your identity. And if someone is pitching you an investment opportunity online claiming to be me … it’s not me.

The wash-up was that it cost me $5,000 in legal fees to put a ‘cease and desist’ on this guy.

Or, as I like to think of it, the cost of a good tractor slasher.

Tread Your Own Path!

I just called … to say … I WANT ALL YOUR MONEY

Hi Scott,

I got a random call from a financial advisor that I have never dealt with before. I have been meaning to get some advice for a while now, so the timing was great. He projects to add $500,000 to $1 million in compounding interest by the time I retire in 22 years, plus savings on my life insurances and income — for an $8,000 set-up fee, plus a 3.5% ongoing annual management fee on my super. How do I work out if it’s legit?

Belinda

Hi Belinda,

You had me at “random call from a financial advisor that I have never dealt with before”.

What would you do if a random bloke called and began chatting you up – talking about candlelight dinners, long walks on the beach, and getting financially frisky. What would you say to him?

You’d tell the creep to bugger off!

Well, this salesperson is trying to sweet-talk himself into your financial pants, Belinda!

Instead, I’d suggest you call your super fund (hopefully a not-for-profit industry fund) and book an appointment with one of their fee-for-service financial advisors. As a general rule the first hour is free, and there’s no smutty talk.

Scott.

I Blew $10,000 on Binary Trading

Hi Scott,

About four years ago I invested $250 in Skyline Markets and learnt how to do binary trading. It seemed very profitable and they hounded me to go to the next level by investing $10,000, which in hindsight I should not have done. Then — lo and behold — they stopped contacting me and the website closed down.

Yes, I was scammed, but now I think I am being scammed again. A financial outfit from London has been ringing and emailing me saying that my initial investment of $10,000 went into an escrow account and is still there in my name. To get this back I have to pay them $1,000, which I will get back immediately when they transfer the money (now $13,440) to me. I am being scammed again, aren’t I?

Sue

Hi Sue,

Yes, you are.

If you haven’t done it already, report it to Scamwatch.gov.au (both the original scam and the latest ‘return rip’). Then chalk it down to experience, and move on with your life. Don’t give it a second thought. And from now on don’t answer emails or telephone calls from people you don’t know.

Scott.

My Wife is Sending Selfies to Russians

Hi Scott,

I am hoping you can solve a disagreement between my wife and myself. I have just read your answer to Lilly, who got herself tangled up with Skyway Investment in Russia. My wife has invested $1,000 with them too. However, they also have a picture of her passport details. Now they are requesting her to take a photograph of herself from various angles so they can confirm who she is. Have you heard of deepfake?! I am concerned they will steal her identity and wipe out our accounts. Thankfully, she has not given them our bank account details, and the credit card number she used for the initial purchase has changed. But I am still concerned. Should I be?

Brad

Hi Brad,

You’re right, Brad, this smells off like a four-day-old beef stroganoff.

(For those of you playing along at home: never, ever, ever email a digital copy of your ID to anyone.)

The job of clearing your name after your identity is stolen takes the average person 27.5 hours.

So let me help save you 27 hours:

First, kiss the $1,000 goodbye. Never communicate with these rogues again in any way, shape or form.

Second, check her credit report and see if anyone has applied for credit in her name.

Third, call the not-for-profit IDCARE on 1800 595 160 and ask their advice on what to do next.

So, Brad, let me raise a glass of vodka to your coming adventure:

Поднимем бокалы за успех!

Scott.

It’s a Scamski!

Barefoot,

My wife is 57 and has invested thousands of dollars into an ‘education investment program’. It is a multi-level marketing program called SkyWay Investment Group (SWIG). You buy units (not shares)! In US dollars! Converted into Russian rubles! The lead-in was that they would develop a transportation company that would revolutionise transport. They seem to have strayed away from that, though, as they are now offering cryptocurrency. My wife believes we are going to be rich when all the dividends are paid. I think the truth is fabricated, but she just says “You don’t believe in me”.

Neale

Hi Neale,

It sounds like your wife has made Skyway Investment Group part of her identity.

That’s a problem because, to quote the first line of SkyWay’s Wikipedia page:

“Financial regulators in Germany, Belgium and 15 other countries have banned the sale of financial products from SkyWay or warned the public about a potential scam.”

So what you could do is whip out your phone and say: “See, I told you so!”

Yet this is probably the dumbest thing you could do.

After all, in her mind, when you attack SkyWay you’re attacking her.

So, what to do?

Well, my advice would be to go on a Barefoot Date Night.

The aim of that night is to show her you believe in her, and that you need her help.

The fact is you’re heading towards retirement, and you need to work together to nail your retirement number (see notes in my Barefoot Investor book to work that out). Then you both need to work hard to achieve it.

Personally, I’d never talk about SkyWay again. Don’t poke the bear!

You’ve lost that money. The worst thing that could happen right now is if you lose the faith and confidence of your life partner. You need to build her up so you can focus on the main goal: securing your retirement.

Scott.

You are in a lot of trouble

After hours of crying, our baby finally dropped off to sleep in his mother’s arms ...

… and then her phone rang.

The noise startled our son, and he began wailing.

“ANSWER IT!” she thundered at me.

I dived on her phone and shepherded it out of the bedroom.

“Hello?” I whined.

“A warrant has been issued for your arrest. Press 1 immediately”, said the recorded message.

I was so sleep deprived that I complied, and was promptly transferred to a human.

“We have found a discarded rental car with 20 pounds of cocaine, fraudulent bank statements, and bloodstains on the seats — the car was rented in your name,” announced the man on the end of the line.

“Who is this?” I yelled.

“My name is Richard Solman. I am an Australian Federal Police Officer. My badge number is 78291. Write that down. Your case number is 4859885. Write that down, too. You are potentially in a lot of trouble”, he warned.

For the next few minutes our conversation reminded me of those I’ve had with my three-year-old when it suddenly dawns on her that her brothers are gone and she has my full undivided attention ... so she keeps the story going on, and on, and on, and on ...

Then Richard went in for the kill.

He reminded me that the call was being recorded, and then asked for my ID.

And after I’d given him my (fake) details, he announced that I’d been a victim of identity theft.

“How much money do you have in your main account, Mister Tape?” he asked.

“I have $13,823”, I said precisely.

This got Richard audibly excited.

“I’m sorry to say that your accounts and your tax file number are compromised. All that money is at risk. We think it could be an inside job … a staff member from the ING bank”, said Rich.

Next, he ordered me to get in my car, drive to my nearest bank branch and transfer my money into what he called a ‘safe’ AFP account for 48 hours … while they got to the bottom of the case.

And all the time I was thinking to myself, “Who would ever fall for this rubbish?”

The correct answer, of course, is “enough people to make it more than worth their while”.

(Generally the most vulnerable people in our society — those with mental health issues and the elderly, who can be confused and intimidated. Last year Aussies lost $36 million from spam calls.)

Hold the phone! Here’s my take:

Twenty-five years ago, the internet lowered the cost of sending spam emails to practically zero. And our inboxes got hammered. Well, for a while, that is, until email providers created spam filters to shield us from the 320 billion junk emails sent each day.

Yet the scammers have now doubled down.

Technology has now lowered the cost of calling to basically zero, and spoofing technology makes it look like they’re calling you from a local number. Which explains why Richard and his mates are just so damn busy. They’re making 500 million spam calls around the world each day.

Yet telcos are busy building the phone version of spam filters (with a nudge from the government). Telstra says it’s blocking up to 500,000 spam calls a day.

My prediction?

Spam calls will soon be as rare as spam emails in your inbox.

Until then … if anyone rings you up with a warrant for your arrest, and asks about a discarded rental car with 20 pounds of cocaine, fraudulent bank statements, and bloodstains on the seats ...

Just press 1 … and tell them it was Mister Tape.

Tread Your Own Path!

Barefoot’s Lovely Aunty shares a shocking story

Hello Magoo!

I’ve been doing a kitchen renovation. My builder, who I’ve known for many years, emailed me his invoice. What I didn’t know is that a scammer had intercepted the builder’s email and changed the bank details. I transferred the money, and kissed goodbye to my $11,000! The bank has not refunded me. Something good has to come from this, can you please share this with your readers?

Aunty Barefoot

Hi Aunty,

That is truly shocking!

It’s even more so when you consider that you live in a small country town, that you’ve known the builder for years, and you were expecting the bill!
This is known as a phishing scam, and it’s much more common than you’d think. 

Right now scammers are targeting people’s super -- signing up for the early release payment.

If you’re not in the habit of checking your super balance, it could be years before you cotton on...

So, here’s what you should do:

Take out your phone right now and check your MyGov account, and make sure that no applications have been made on your behalf and that your contact details haven’t been changed. That’s how the scammers are doing it.

Second, verify every large bill you get. Take 30-seconds to call the person up and check that you have the right bank details. Businesses may be shut down in this pandemic, but it’s Christmas time for crooks!

Kochie Gets Into Bitcoin?

Hi Scott

I have always liked David Kosch … and now he appears to be advertising Bitcoin trading. The ad promises, like other get-rich-quick schemes, instant wealth. My question is, though Bitcoin has recently crashed, is it OK now as the ad is saying? Could you advise me on a $500 investment with Bitcoin in this lousy viral climate?

Gill

Hey Gill,

Two things: firstly, it’s David Koch … and, secondly, the ad you’ve seen is a scam. 

It has absolutely nothing to do with Kochie, or Bitcoin for that matter. I know this because scammers have used my name and image in the past. And right now they’re using Dick Smith in their ads quite a bit too. 

They can afford to plaster these ads right across the internet because (a) they’re obviously not paying talent fees and (b) they’re making out like bandits — literally! — making millions of dollars ripping people off.  

Stick to the Sunrise Cash Cow. 

Scott

Life-Changing Money

Hi Scott,

I am currently listening to a crowd who are selling a trading program to get into ‘call’ and ‘put’ options. I do not understand a thing about the stock market, and do not have a lot of time to sit in front of my screen watching the stock market to earn “life-changing money”. But in this tragic time, where people are dying worldwide, is options trading something I should look into?

Terry

Hi Terry,

No, it’s not.

Scott

Help! My Boyfriend is a Swinger

Hi Scott,

My boyfriend is interested in ‘swing trading’. He saw it on Facebook. He says you give them $100 and then you get $1,000 back in seven days. I think it is a scam and not a healthy way to manifest income. However, I have this bias because I hate get-rich-quick schemes. Would you please explain what it is and whether it is worth it.

Belinda

Hi Belinda, I’m with you — it’s a scam.

However, if he’s not going to listen to you then I think it’s worth encouraging him to go through with it.

Think of it this way: your boyfriend will get a real-world, lifelong lesson in greed and stupidity.

And all it’s going to cost him is $100?

Sounds like a good deal to me. Just let him know that I think he’ll probably lose a lot more than $100.

Why?

Well, firstly, because he is GIVING MONEY TO A CRIMINAL.

And, secondly, because the scammers fishing on Facebook may bait their hooks with $100, but their real aim is to reel in thousands of dollars from their victims ... and they’ll use whatever psychological tricks they can to extract more money. They may let him nibble on a bit of shrimp, but he’ll end up in a deep fryer eventually.

Sounds like a swinging good time, right?

Scott

He Threatened to Kill Me

Hi Scott,

I read your column on scams and wanted to share my story. I got a call a couple of years ago and knew straight away that it was a scam due to the guy’s funny accent, but I decided to play along for fun. I said yes to all of the questions and pretended to be really excited. After about thirty minutes I jokingly offered my credit card details and even the password to my online banking. I wish I hadn’t.

The guy on the other end of the phone was furious at being mocked. Straight away he went from nice to nasty and told me he was going to slit my throat! I was a bit unnerved but chuckled and said “but I thought we were friends now”. He began to threaten me by saying he knew where I lived and that his ‘boys’ would be around shortly. I doubted this but was still crapping my dacks a little.

I said I had to go now and hung up. The bloke proceeded to ring back about ten times in a row. I answered once again and tried to laugh and pretend I wasn’t worried. He told me I was the winner of the ‘Golden Casket’, along with a few more threats of throat slitting. So now when I get these calls I’m not a smart alec and say politely “not interested, thank you”.

Jason

Hi Jason,

Don’t think of them as harmless scammers.

There are reports of Australians who have been murdered in Nigeria trying to get their money back.

The truth is that they’re highly organised crime syndicates that are (collectively) making billions of dollars a year, and they have little patience for being messed about.

In the week after I registered my number with the scam website Bitcoin Profits, I received dozens of phone calls at all hours of the day and night. They’ve even worked out how to make it appear like they’re calling from an Aussie landline. Regardless, each time I politely said: ‘I know this is a scam, please never call me again’ and then I’d hang up. After a week they gave up.

Scott

The Day My Dad Got a Viral STD

Hi Scott,

Recently I noticed my elderly father had gone downhill, was very quiet and was looking a bit depressed.

When I asked him, he told me that he was on a website he ‘probably shouldn’t have been’ on when the screen started to flash “YOUR COMPUTER HAS BEEN INFECTED WITH A VIRUS — DO NOT SHUT DOWN AS YOU WILL DAMAGE YOUR COMPUTER PERMANENTLY”.

He was directed to ring an overseas number to remove the virus. When he rang, they sounded professional and said they could certainly help him. He gave them remote access to his computer and requested his credit card. They charged him around $800 for the ‘virus removal’ and a further $1,200 for ‘repairs’.

Naturally he was distressed. The next day on reflection he decided to cancel his credit card. For a couple of days thereafter he was suffering from guilt and worry about any further money he might lose. Luckily, Commbank were great — they got the bogus charges refunded and gave him a new credit card. We also got his computer checked over. I always feel sorry for the oldies that don’t have someone to protect them.

Lisa

I wonder what website he was on that he ‘probably shouldn’t have been?’

Maybe collingwoodfc.com.au? Though on second thoughts, I reckon he was looking at birds ... but maybe not magpies.

I included this question because of the sheer number of people who wrote to me who’d been caught out on similar websites. (Another version of this scam happens via email, where you’re instructed to deposit a substantial amount of money to a bitcoin account within 35 days or they would release video of you watching porn, to your entire contacts list).

This scam exploits the emotion of shame and humiliation. The scammers hope you’ll pay the money, and never speak about it again, which I assume some people do. After all, can you imagine how embarrassing it would be to tell your daughter you’re a Collingwood supporter?

Scott