Greater Manchester Police has issued a warning over an online scam that has seen people lose thousands of pounds. They took to social media to warn people, saying that nationally nearly 100 people have been tricked by it, losing more than £44,000 to the scammers. GMP captioned the post: “Nationally 95 people have reported losing over £44,000 to this scam. “Please share this message to help others falling victim for this online scam. For up to date information on scams & some of the work we are doing to combat Fraud”.
According to GMP, there has been a surge in reports from people who have received messages supposedly from friends or family via Facebook Messenger, asking if they could use their PayPal account to receive funds from an eBay sale. The scammers are pretending to be victims’ friends and family to trick them into accepting. A common trick is to say they have sold a camera on eBay but either don’t have PayPal or that their account isn’t working, asking if they can use the victim’s account instead. After accepting the money into their PayPal account, they are then asked to transfer it to the fraudster – once the money has been sent over to the scammer, the initial transaction is reversed leaving the victim’s account in negative balance.
To keep yourself safe from it, GMP are advising people to secure their account, never respond to requests to send money, always verify financial requests, and to inform their bank or service provider straight away if they have made a payment.
