Scam alert: Conveyancing fraud

Tansy_1980

Please be careful if you receive an email from your solicitor asking you to advance your deposit. Check the details with the firm directly before transferring money. This poor woman lost over £75,000

http://www.belfasttelegraph.co.uk/news/northern-ireland/co-down-woman-loses-77000-in-email-scam-31602094.html

agrinnall

So how did the fraudster know that she had receive the previous email from her solicitor?

1) Somebody in the solicitor's office - complain to the relevant regulator
2) Somebody in the family home - is there a brand new Beemer parked on the drive?
3) Hacked email account allowing the fraudster to see your emails as they arrive - use better security in future.

dacouch

agrinnall wrote: »

So how did the fraudster know that she had receive the previous email from her solicitor?

1) Somebody in the solicitor's office - complain to the relevant regulator
2) Somebody in the family home - is there a brand new Beemer parked on the drive?
3) Hacked email account allowing the fraudster to see your emails as they arrive - use better security in future.

It's a fairly common scam now days, they target building contractors and solicitors along with anyone else who invoices others for largish amounts of money.

They hack into their email accounts, look through the emails and then send send an email out changing an invoice slightly to include the bank account details they want the money sent to.

The scams are more common on Friday afternoons as they find the people making the payments are less cautious.

In most cases the person sending the money is the person who has lost the money and not the company invoicing so their bill will still be due

Arahant

It gets worse - there is a new update on the Belfast Telegraph story, and now, not only did this poor woman lose the £77k that was supposed to be going into the solicitor's holding account - now she is in breach of contract and if she can't pay out a replacement 77k, then she is also going to lose the £30k deposit that she had put down for the house she'd been intending to buy!!
This is so unjust!! Why is Barclays bank where the funds ended up not able to divulge that miscreant account holder's details to the police - Surely in order to have opened up a bank account that person would have had to provide proof of identity?! Also why has the name of the solicitor's office in question not been disclosed so that other clients are aware of possible security issues? Why isn't the wider public being better warned that email systems of solicitors have been hacked - is it because these 'professional' solicitors will have to admit that they have fallen foul of the Data Protection Act and would then be subject to litigation? Apparently a financial journalist told the BBC Nolan show that this is by no means an isolated event - in fact a caller phoned the show to say that her Lurgan-based solicitor had warned all clients three weeks ago that they had to shut down their email systems due to a security breach.

PasturesNew

£734k: http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-34432596

£340k: http://www.telegraph.co.uk/finance/personalfinance/borrowing/mortgages/11605010/Fraudsters-hacked-emails-to-my-solicitor-and-stole-340000-from-my-property-sale.html

£50k: http://www.dailymail.co.uk/femail/article-3128084/Single-mother-faces-financial-ruin-losing-life-savings-50-000-internet-scammers-pretending-solicitor.html

"large sum of money": http://www.thenorthernecho.co.uk/news/12913483.Darlington_law_firm_reassures_clients_after_losing__large_sum_of_money__to_sophisticated_scam/

4 solicitors/£2million: http://www.legalfutures.co.uk/latest-news/phone-scams-hit-solicitors-four-firms-losing-2m

£300k: http://www.telegraph.co.uk/finance/personalfinance/borrowing/mortgages/11715616/Our-300000-house-buying-money-was-stolen.html

davidmcn

Arahant wrote: »

Why is Barclays bank where the funds ended up not able to divulge that miscreant account holder's details to the police

Where does it say they haven't? They will if the police have a warrant, otherwise it's a breach of customers' confidentiality.

Surely in order to have opened up a bank account that person would have had to provide proof of identity?!

Yes, but even if that ID was genuine, often the person operating the account is just a gullible participant being offered a cut for "processing payments", not the Mr Big behind it all.

Tansy_1980

The Law Society of NI did circulate an email to all its members several weeks ago warning them of this scam. It's just unfortunate (and ridiculously poor customer service) if any solicitor firm did not then forward this message to its client list or improve its security systems as a result

wwl

The banks have to bear some responsibility for this being possible - large sums arriving in accounts should trigger some checks, especially if not a regular occurrance, and it is rapidly withdrawn or transferred elsewhere. Things like AML legislation mean it should be possible to trace where it goes.
Like credit card fraud, they obviously consider their profits more important than protecting their customers.

AlistairM

I think when the time comes to transfer money in those amounts it's probably a good idea to call your solicitors first and confirm the email was from them and also to double check the details they've given you.

clint_S

Lets be honest here, it is extremely unlikely that the "hacking" was on the solicitors email system, most solicitors use internal emails servers, yes usually outdated but more secure than Hotmail. The likely hood was that she had the issue, whether virus or other means (poor password etc) that made it easy for the "hacker" to simply send the email after she received her.


I would say this is more a warning to make sure your security on your computer, accounts, and emails are secure.


This isn't a new threat and people have been doing this for years, I'm surprised people still fall for the phone calls.


£734k: http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-34432596 - She shouldn't worry her money from the Nigerian prince is due soon.
£340k: http://www.telegraph.co.uk/finance/personalfinance/borrowing/mortgages/11605010/Fraudsters-hacked-emails-to-my-solicitor-and-stole-340000-from-my-property-sale.html - better password security, don't click on dodgy links or websites, and virus scan your machine.
£50k: http://www.dailymail.co.uk/femail/article-3128084/Single-mother-faces-financial-ruin-losing-life-savings-50-000-internet-scammers-pretending-solicitor.html - same as above
"large sum of money": http://www.thenorthernecho.co.uk/news/12913483.Darlington_law_firm_reassures_clients_aft er_losing__large_sum_of_money__to_sophisticated_sc am/ - idiot who fell for this needs to be warned about Nigerian princes.

4 solicitors/£2million: http://www.legalfutures.co.uk/latest-news/phone-scams-hit-solicitors-four-firms-losing-2m - same as above.

£300k: http://www.telegraph.co.uk/finance/personalfinance/borrowing/mortgages/11715616/Our-300000-house-buying-money-was-stolen.html - better password security, don't click on dodgy links or websites, and virus scan your machine.

csgohan4

Do Solicitor indeminity covers this?