“One of the red flags that it may be a scam, is the vague opening message where the fraudster doesn’t actually say specifically who they are. Jordan Coates, fraud protect officer, said: “Recently we’ve seen a huge rise in the number of reports relating to this scam, where the fraudster pretends to be a relative of the victim and claiming to have lost or damaged their phone or changed number suddenly. The fraudster will then claim there is a time-critical emergency and that they need funds – such as they have a problem with their bank account and urgently need to pay a bill – so they ask the victim to transfer money to a different account to the one they would normally use.

The victim, concerned for their child’s welfare, often responds by asking if the person at the other end is really their son or daughter and inadvertently tells the fraudster what their child’s name is, who in turn texts back to confirm that it is them. They then go on to claim they have lost their phone or it has been damaged and are now using a different number. Typically, the fraudster will send a message from a mobile phone number that the victim doesn’t recognise and begin a conversation by saying something non-specific, such as ‘Hi Mum’ or ‘Hi Dad’. We’re asking people to be wary and report an increasingly common scam where fraudsters use WhatsApp to dupe victims into transferring money by pretending to be their child.

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