Category: Scams

  • FCA warns of copycat site offering investments

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    Arthur Beverly
    in

    The Financial Conduct Authority (FCA) has issued a warning over an unauthorised firm moonlighting as an investments branch of the regulator. The firm is using the name FCA Investments and has used the FCA’s logo on its website along with that of the Financial Services Compensation Scheme (FSCS) which it says covers its investors. The…

  • Women ‘victims in 63% of romance scams’

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    Arthur Beverly
    in

    I was reading earlier, ahead of Valentine’s Day on Thursday, about recent scam data published by Action Fraud – the 4,555 instances of ‘romance fraud’ reported to the police reporting centre in 2018. Some £50m was lost in such scams last year as fraudsters pretended to be romantically attached to their victims, says the piece.…

  • Almost £200m lost through investment fraud in 2018

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    by

    Arthur Beverly
    in ,

    According to an article in “MoneyAge”, a News Sheet for IFAs, victims of investment fraud lost over £197m in 2018 as scammers use increasingly “sophisticated tactics” to persuade people to invest their savings, according to new figures from Action Fraud. The Financial Conduct Authority (FCA) issued a warning to potential victims of investment scams today,…

  • Savers urged to be vigilant after fraudsters steal £202m from pensions

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    Arthur Beverly
    in , , ,

    I noticed this piece in the Mail on Sunday and found it to be very disturbing. The Insolvency Service, which is a part of the Department for Business, has shut down some 24 companies guilty of pension abuse since 2015, according to this Mail on Sunday piece. Around 3,750 victims have been affected, including both…

  • Email Scams

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    Arthur Beverly
    in

    I’ve just read in a well respected Financial Periodical that a Financial Adviser in England has received an email from a Hitman that suggested a Competitor of the Adviser wanted his ‘head on a stick’ and requested £5,000 be sent to an anonymous Bitcoin account to spare his life. They added that usually they would…

  • Scammers posing as legal and financial professionals

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    Arthur Beverly
    in

    It would appear that more and more people are falling victim to scammers posing as professionals from financial and legal services, Citizens Advice has warned. A recent report has indicated that such professional scams now account for a fifth of all scams reported to the charity’s consumer service helpline after seeing a 6 per cent…