Listeners of radio station Cape Talk called in to report hundreds of thousands of Rands had been fraudulently taken out of their First National Bank (FNB) accounts on Monday. Both personal and business customers had been affected. , Following the calls one forensic consultant warned customers against banking with FNB. He claims that there is internal collusion, with the fraudsters knowing which accounts have significant amounts of money.
Furthermore, reports claim that the scammers need to know your number and bank account details. In these cases, the victims of the fraud are being sent OTPs (one time pins) that are being accessed and used by the scammers to withdraw the money from their bank accounts.
It is claimed that FNB clients who are also customers of MTN are being targeted, according to an interview on Cape Talk with Dr David Klatzow, a private forensic consultant. Klatzow believes this problem has been going on for a while, yet both companies have been slow to come to the table to find a solution.
When contacted by Justmoney, FNB released a blanket statement claiming that it cannot address the individual cases at this time, however a “rigorous investigation” is currently under way.
“FNB deals with matters of fraud on a case by case basis through applying a rigorous investigation process. At this stage we cannot divulge any information related to these cases, affected clients will be engaged directly once the investigations have been concluded.
“We would like to encourage customers to familiarise themselves with FNB security centre by visiting www.fnb.co.za to acquire the latest security information,” said FNB.
Furthermore, FNB offered the following tips:
- Never click on links or icons in unsolicited mails
- Do not reply to these e-mails. Delete immediately
- Do not believe the content of unsolicited e-mails