In this week’s blog post we want to share a story about one of our clients, who recently fell victim to a financial fraud scam. Our client asked us to share their story to help prevent anyone else from falling victim to the same thing. Last week our client had a urgent project to work on in the morning and opened their computer only to find the computer screen was frozen. On the screen the was a number to call Microsoft, our client called and thought she was speaking with Microsoft but she was not. The fraudster told our client that their banking was potentially compromised and they would pass our client directly over to RBC. Our client stayed on the line and spoke with another fraudster who was pretending to be with RBC Security. They informed our client there was a potential fraudulent withdraw that was going to take place on their account within the next two hours and it was best to take the funds out and move it to a secure government Bitcoin account for the time being. Our client took all the cash out of her chequing accounts and deposited 50% to the fraudsters Bitcoin accounts before realizing this was a scam.

Looking back on the events our clients can see so many signs that they should stops and this was a scam but in the moment they felt it was hard to see as she felt rushed and in a panic.

We wanted to share this story as well as the following link to RBC Cybersecurity How Criminals Make Contact. This talks about how crimes will try and make contact through

• Email Scams
• Phone and Messaging Scams
• Social Media Scams
• Online Dating Scams
• Tax Scams

The link also explains what you should do in each situation.