Students are being reminded to be cautious after reports of a serious fraud scam targeting international students.
The scam, which has targeted students at the University of Liverpool, aims to convince victims that their debit or credit card has been used to commit serious fraud, and large payments are requested.
Key features of the scam
- Contact made by someone claiming to represent the police (or other official body) from your home country
- They may have information about you and seem to be very convincing
- You could be provided with a link to a webpage to confirm the authenticity of the caller, this is a fake webpage which appears genuine
- After an initial call/video call, communication may be moved to the app QQ
- They may claim that your debit/credit card has been used to commit serious fraud and that you and your family are at risk
- Told not to alert British Police and that you must not discuss with your family or friends
- They may insist you report your every move to them 24 hours a day. They may try to convince you that you are being monitored and that if you return to your home country you will be arrested
- You may be told to transfer large sums of money to a different account so they can check the funds
- You may also be asked to hand over control of your banking account to them
- Further payments may be requested to disconnect you and your family from the ‘crime’
- You may also be encouraged to borrow money to make the payments
- There are multiple different callers involved in the scam, so you may speak to lots of different people.
If you are contacted and any of these points feel relevant, end the call immediately. Do not give any personal details to the caller to do not make any payments to them.
You will then need to contact the International Advice and Guidance Team who will support you to contact the British Police through ACTION FRAUD. You can also contact ACTION FRAUD directly on 0300 123 2040.
If you have been told not to contact anyone, please be assured that our International Advice and Guidance team operate confidentially.
For further information about security and safe computing, please visit our Computing Services information page.