BY JAMES SIMONS
Manchester Police have released a CCTV image of a man they want to speak to in connection with a series of high-value frauds. Two Barclays customers reported to a total of £112,000 missing from their bank accounts in withdrawals and purchases between September 10 and October 7, 2015.
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The two fraudsters first called Barclays Bank to request new debit cards, a credit card, and pin numbers for each card, and amazingly passed all security questions. The fraudsters clearly either knew the victims or were tipped off by individuals close to the victims. New cards and pin numbers were subsequently posted out to an address given by the fraudsters.
On September 22, 2015, five set of withdrawals each comprising of £4,850 were taken over a number of hours from one of the customers’ accounts spread over a number of branches in the capital.
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The ambitious fraudsters were then emboldened between October 4 and 6, to make withdrawals amounting to £92,700 from the second victim’s account at Barclays branches across Greater Manchester and Cheshire
RE-IMBURSED
Greater Manchester Police revealed that the man pictured in the CCTV attempted to buy a watch worth £26,400 using one of the victim’s cards from Goldsmith’s jewellers in the Trafford Centre but was declined
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Detetective Sergeant David Henshell said: “Both victims have now been reimbursed by the bank, meaning that Barclays is now the victim of this crime.
“But that should take nothing away from the severity of the fraud, which has seen two innocent people have their identities stolen and their accounts hacked.
“There was a total disregard for their privacy and their personal property, with the fraudsters taking a close look at each victim’s financial statements before extracting as much money as possible from each.
“We are very keen to speak to the man pictured in Goldsmiths
The fraud is a grim reminder that people must be very wary of divulging security details to anybody no matter how close they may perceive them to be. That is why they are called security details because they are meant to be kept private.
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