

When I downloaded the Telstra app some time ago, I remembered the number of services I was paying for gave me "gold customer service". I have quite a few services from Telstra - mobile phone, internet, Foxtel and a couple of prepaid SMS cards.
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I thought this was just a Telstra glitch that would soon be sorted now my new password had been installed. I was starting to breathe a little more calmly and my heart rate was down.īut hang on - I could send emails but not receive them. A couple of hours later all our accounts are frozen. I raced home and started contacting my banks and financial services providers.

They helped me to remove the crooks' phone number, and reinstall my mobile as my contact number. So, I cancelled all my appointments and raced to a Telstra store with phone bills and proof of ID.Ī staff member checked my ID, opened my account and provided me with a new password. I tried calling the fraud line - same message.Īs the crooks had applied their password, I had no access to my account. A recorded message said, "extensive delays, go to the Telstra app". What were the crooks planning next?īreathing deeply, I remembered the lessons of scams and fraud I have written about for decades.įirst up, I had to regain control of my Telstra account to stop the bleeding. It will be a whole stack of personal, business and financial information. Think about what your email inbox and sent items contain. My heart rate was still very high though. In this case, they will also not do a transfer without verbal confirmation, a third security factor. Obviously it did not succeed because of the two-factor authentification used by any reputable financial services company. The crooks had used our personal information to construct a very convincing email. Our advisor sent me the email they had received. This woke me from my relaxed Monday morning! A financial services company phoned to ask about our instructions to sell $35,000 of shares we hold and to purchase Bitcoin. This was my first mistake - the failure to act quickly.įortunately though, I was saved by a phone call. We've all seen these, and I figured there was a poor connection to our wifi, as the error message said "no connection to the server". With the "account change" warning going to the scammers, not me, the first clue that something was amiss was an "account error" warning when I tried to send an email.
