North Midlands Credit Union issue fraud warning

North Midlands Credit Union are reminding credit union members and the public at large to be vigilant when it comes to the security of their accounts and their personal information.

With increasing levels of fraudulent activity targeting the public, the credit union have provided guidance to help avoid scams.

• Be careful of unsolicited contact that appears to be from your bank or credit union requesting verification of account numbers and/ or passwords. Credit unions will enver request your full personal access code or password.

• Don’t assume an email, call or text is genuine because someone has basic information like your name or address. Fraudsters may use publicly available information to lure you in.

• Number spoofing (making it appear as if a call or message is coming from a genuine number) is becoming more prevalent and sophisticated. If in doubt about any call or text received, contact your credit union directly.

• Fraudsters are good at making e-mails look genuine and have been known to set up elaborate and convincing dummy websites. Check the web address of a website carefully. It is safer to manually enter a web address into the address bar of your browser.

• If somebody contacts you out of the blue offering you money or an easy way to make money, it is probably too good to be true.

• If you have previously been a victim of a scam, it is more likely that you will be targeted again. Please remain vigilant in order to protect yourself.

• Scams can take many formats. If something doesn’t feel right, it probably isn’t. Take your time to think things through and don’t feel pressured into making a decision that you might later regret.

Tom Allen, manager of the North Midlands Credit Union, said: “Fraudsters and scam artists are increasingly sophisticated in their efforts to defraud unsuspecting people by tricking them into handing over their personal information.

“This includes passwords, security questions and answers, verification codes and other security information. We have seen an increased in such activity recently in line with scams across all sectors.

“We are keen to raise awareness of the issues and threats, and would like to remind our members, and the public, that your local credit union will never contact them by phone or text, or by any other means to request account information.

"We would ask the public to never respond to such messages and contact their credit union immediately if they receive a suspicious communication.”