Warning after firms caught by bank scam

At least three local businesses in Guernsey fell victim to a banking scam on Thursday, an IT expert has said

People in Guernsey have been warned to be vigilant after an IT expert said three firms fell victim to a banking scam in one day.

The Office of the Data Protection Authority (ODPA) warned islanders to "exercise extreme caution" after it received reports of a rise in telephone scams in recent weeks.

The ODPA said "fraudsters have been telephoning people, posing as representatives of a bank" or other organisation asking them to download "malicious software".

It said: "If you receive an unexpected call – no matter how credible it sounds – hang up and contact the alleged caller using a trusted means of communication such as a number from the company's website."

'Convincing scammers'

The authority said islanders should be "particularly cautious" of scammers trying to trick people using the the worldwide IT outage as part of their cover story.

Pierre Jehan, the director of a Guernsey IT company, said three of his customers fell victim to a "sophisticated" scam which gave hackers "complete control" of their computers.

He said they were phoned on Thursday by "convincing scammers with perfect English accents" pretending to be from NatWest International asking them to download software.

Some of the users later noticed their mouse cursors moving without them doing anything, he said.

He said this type of scam was called vishing and relied on phone calls that trick people into doing something which compromises their IT systems.

None of the businesses suffered any financial loss on this occasion, but the fact the scammers appeared to speak English well led people to trust them, he added.

'Pause and verify'

NatWest International said on its website it was "aware that fraudsters have recently been calling customers impersonating the bank".

"They might ask you to download software which they can use to gather information from your device," it said.

"If you think you have been targeted by criminals, hang up and contact us immediately using the number on the back of your card or one of our published numbers."

Guernsey suffered 39 personal data breaches during in the second half of last year, affecting more than 14,000 people, according to new statistics released by the ODPA.

Brent Homan, the Bailiwick's Data Protection Commissioner, said it was important for people to focus on "attention to detail".

"When sending out sensitive information it is always a good practice to 'pause and verify' before you hit that send button," he said.