Beware of Email Redirection Scams…
Known as ‘payment redirection’ scams, these stings often target high-value financial transactions such as real estate purchases and business contracts. Unfortunately, there are cases in WA of Settlement Agent’s emails being intercepted or mimicked, resulting in an innocent party transferring their funds to an account of the scammers, and not of the actual business, they think the money is going to!
The most recent case was in April 2022 when a WA woman reported losing approximately $732,000 after scammers intercepted email communication between her and her settlement agent! This is not the only case here in WA in the last 12 months and we are working hard and continuing to update our communication and systems to educate our clients in ensuring they personally check any account details received via email.
| Some tips to protect yourself against such payment redirection scams include: * Call the sender to confirm the authenticity of any payment transfer requests. When doing so, do not – rely on any contact details contained in the email as these could be fake. * Check for spelling errors in the email address or generic domains such as @gmail.com or @hotmail.com. Often it can just be one letter different in the email address and therefore hard to spot. * Consider setting up multi-factor authentication on all online accounts such as email, bank and social media. Learn more amount scam types and ways to protect yourself at WAScamNet website linked here. |
| It is important to note, that we will never email you our Trust Account Details. If you receive any such email please call us directly at the office on 9791 2722 to confirm with us directly BEFORE transferring any funds. |