The notorious scam is still doing the rounds – and it’s an alarmingly successful method
Billions of users worldwide use WhatsApp, but now they are all being warned that one scam is still doing its rounds – and successfully.
Despite countless warnings, scammers are still able to steal thousands from those who do not know about it, or fall for it and send their details.
The infamous parent scam is a disturbingly effective technique for criminals to extract cash from vulnerable WhatsApp users. For those unfamiliar with this trick, the text often start off with something innocent such as “Hi mum” or “Hi dad” and once the person falls for it, the scammers swoop in and con them.
Should the target fall for the initial approach, the scammers make up a story about losing their phone and that they need money for a replacement. Whilst it might sound like no parent would fall for this, the scammers are becoming smarter, and victims have been conned out of thousands.
Latest data from Santander UK reveals that fraudsters impersonating sons have achieved the greatest success, with those pretending to be daughters coming second. This was then followed by fake mums.
In a bid to stop further people becoming victims of this con, Action Fraud released a new alert encouraging WhatsApp users to remain cautious, reports Bristol Live.
“Beware of fraudsters posing as friends or family, and claiming to need urgent financial help,” Action Fraud warned in a post on X (previously Twitter).
Their guidance stated: “If a family member or friend makes an unusual request on WhatsApp, always call the person outside of WhatsApp to confirm their identity.”
Action Fraud further encourages people to remain alert and take swift action by blocking any odd messages and reporting them if they believe they’ve been targeted by a messaging scam.
They explained: “Report spam messages or block a sender within WhatsApp.
“Press and hold on the message bubble, select ‘Report’ and then follow the instructions. If you lost money as a result of the scam message, please report it to Action Fraud.”
The advice is simple – if you receive a text from an unfamiliar sender, don’t respond.
If the message purports to be from a family member, ignore the text and ring your relative directly to confirm it’s genuine and establish whether it’s fraudulent.
