Aussie loses $20,000 after paying what he thought were legal fees when he fell victim to an elaborate scam
A film director and comedian has shared his devastation at losing $20,000 to an elaborate scam.
Brett D’Souza, a 48-year-old father from Melbourne, believed he was making legitimate payments to a law firm when, in reality, he was unknowingly sending money to scammers.
Mr D’Souza received an invoice from what he thought was the legal firm passing on its updated bank details and even exchanged several emails to confirm the information.
What he did not realise was that the company’s email system had been compromised by hackers.
By the time Mr D’Souza discovered the fraud, it was too late.
Although he immediately contacted his bank, Westpac, the funds could not be recovered.
Adding to his frustration, Mr D’Souza later discovered that the fraudulent account receiving his money had been opened at ANZ.
He believes ANZ should be held responsible for his $20,000 loss.
Brett D’Souza (pictured) says ANZ should be held responsible for his $20,000 scam loss
He argues that stronger verification processes should have prevented the account from being created in the first place.
‘I want my money back and I think it’s on ANZ,’ Mr D’Souza told Daily Mail Australia.
‘If you set up an account with a name purporting to be a business, surely there should be some checks and balances?
‘Did they ask for an ABN or an ACN?’
He acknowledged that the scammers were ‘clever’ in how they disguised the account, using a slightly altered name from that of the law firm to avoid detection.
In this case, the account name had been subtly changed, replacing the abbreviation ‘Ltd.’ with the full word ‘Limited’.
Simon Smith, a Cyber Expert and head of Fraud at SCAMAssist, said that Mr D’Souza’s situation ‘highlights serious systemic gaps in the way banks handle scam prevention’.
‘While consumers have a responsibility to exercise caution, banks equally have a duty of care to be a ‘diligent prudent banker’,’ he said.
Brett D’Souza (pictured) thought he was paying a law firm, unaware he’d fallen victim to an elaborate scam
Mr Smith added that banks have the technology to combat scams and are in a ‘much more powerful position’ to detect suspicious patterns.
‘Too often they fail to intervene in time, despite the extensive representations on their websites and media bragging how good their scam prevention systems are,’ he said.
The Westpac website details a ‘Westpac Verify’ system, which they say ‘Checks the account details and names match, to help you pay the right person’.
On the same page, they say that an enhancement to the system to include Confirmation of Payee is ‘coming soon’.
Confirmation of Payee is a tool developed by Australian Payments Plus and the Australian Banking Association.
The system will allow them to confirm the payee name via an industry wide database before the payment goes through, and is expected to be widely rolled out this year.
‘Ultimately, banks must move beyond simply warning customers with generic scam advisories,’ Mr Smith said.
‘They should be practicing what they preach, proactively monitoring and acting on real-time behavioural anomalies and intervening where necessary to protect victims.
Cybersecurity expert Simon Smith said banks often ‘fail to intervene’ during scams
‘In my view, there is a strong argument that banks should share a far greater portion of liability for scam losses than what they do now, particularly when their internal systems fail to prevent foreseeable harm.’
In a statement to Daily Mail Australia, a Westpac spokesperson said stopping scams was one of their highest priorities.
‘When a customer transfers their money to a scammer, we work hard to recover the money where possible. Unfortunately it’s not always possible,’ they said.
‘We encourage anyone making large payments or paying an invoice to always use extra caution, including phoning the number of the provider from a public website to confirm payment details.’
ANZ and the Australian Banking Association were contacted for comment.
