16 March 2023 , 08:38
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How depressing, though hardly surprising, to see more frauds being enabled by Facebook.
Despite numerous warnings and promises that it will clean up its act, the social media giant is still running adverts placed by criminals that target savers.
These scam ads shouldn’t be hard for Facebook to spot – they use similar artwork and make similar offers.
“Invest safely in secured UK bonds,” runs the latest version I’ve seen, for an outfit calling itself Wealth Management Group.
“Concerned about rising inflation?” it asks. “Download your free guide and learn how to secure a fixed rate of interest now with UK income bonds.”
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I can think of few more dangerous things to do with your savings than replying to an ad on Facebook, and to prove the point I did just that.
Clicking on the ad takes you to fixed-rate.org, a website created just three weeks ago.
A clue to the fact that this is an old scam rehashed is that the crooks haven’t got round to updating the artwork – the picture of the brochure on the website still calls it the “2022 Income Bonds Investor Guide”.
But there is no guide. If you fill in your contact details, as I did using a pseudonym, you’re called by someone who will lie about working for a respected investment institution.
In this case, it’s Schroders Personal Wealth, part of Scottish Widows, with the caller saying that his name was James Thompson and that he was a wealth adviser.
He offered savings products ranging from a one-year Schroders Personal Wealth bond paying 4.85% to a three- year bond paying 5.45%.
“The bonds are covered by the Financial Services Compensation Scheme, you are protected up to £85,000, and you can still get a good yield,” he told me.
Better rates might be available elsewhere, he added, but would they be in safe investments like these?
“I say to clients, what do you value most, the extra income or sleeping at night? Most opt for the latter," he said.
Anyone doing due diligence might check LinkedIn and be reassured to find there is a James Thompson employed by Schroders Personal Wealth.
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But the person emailing and phoning me had hijacked the name.
The email addresses that he used, [email protected] and [email protected], are not genuine Schroders Personal Wealth ones, the brochure I was sent is a fake, and the bonds that I was offered do not exist. The 0208 1020729 phone number given on the emails appears on the Financial Conduct Authority’s scams alert list alongside numerous other versions of this fraud that have appeared on Facebook.
Having feigned interest, I was then asked to provide ID to comply with their anti-money laundering policy. These crooks couldn’t care less about money laundering, this was just another charade designed to give themselves legitimacy, and probably harvest my personal data at the same time.
I contacted Schroders Personal Wealth who alerted the Financial Conduct Authority and the Metropolitan Police, and the scam email addresses have been suspended and the phone number is no longer in use.
“We have recently been made aware of a case where an organisation is masquerading as leading UK wealth management brands, attempting to sell fraudulent investments to members of the public," said a Schroders Personal Wealth spokesperson.
"We are not affiliated to this organisation and our product offering does not include these types of investments.
"This incident has been reported to the Financial Conduct Authority and Metropolitan Police who are in the process of taking steps to stop this organisation from operating.
"We have informed our colleagues, placed a warning on our website to help raise awareness amongst the public and have also suspended any websites associated with this case.
"Unfortunately this issue isn’t isolated to ourselves. Across the industry we are seeing increased activity from fraudsters trying to trick people into making false investments by impersonating genuine financial services firms."
After I approached Facebook for comment it removed this latest version of the scam. That's useful, but only so long as new versions do not take its place.
This is a scandal I've repeatedly highlighted, for instance here and here. Last year Facebook’s owner Meta promised that it would only carry investment adverts placed by companies regulated by the Financial Conduct Authority.
So why hasn’t it stopped taking money from fraudsters to promote their scams?
I’m still waiting for an explanation.