Alex Trelinski
A man tricked a woman out of €44,000 after arranging to meet her at the Finestrat Shopping Centre on the Costa Blanca.
The fraudster, 20, borrowed the victim’s phone to make a call.
He noted down her personal details on her banking app, which he used three times later to make the illegal withdrawals.
The woman, 44, went to the Guardia Civil in Finestrat late last year to say that she had been scammed.
She told officers she struck up a online friendship when she was looking for legal advice on a personal matter.
Out of the blue, the man from Ugena in Toledo Province, called her to say he had travelled over 450 kilometres to Finestrat.
They fixed up a face-to-face meeting, where he stole her banking log-in details.
Guardia Civil cybercrime specialists from Alicante tracked down the young conman within a week of the woman’s complaint being filed.
The good news is that all of the stolen money has been transferred back to the victim’s account.
The Guardia have warned people to be careful of putting themselves into any situation where private online information could be accessed, especially by strangers.
READ MORE:
- Spain’s CaixaBank warns customers about fake phone messages known as ‘smishing’
- Barcelona boy masterminds €150,000 online fraud to con approximately 100 people in Spain
- Cops warn of increasing number of bank scams as fraudsters target residents in Spain’s Palma
