Is the greeting personal?
Do they address you as sir or madam, or even just a general ‘loyal customer’? A genuine email will address you by your full name:
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Fraud guide
Fake emails
How this page can help you
Fake emails
Often fraudsters will send emails pretending to be from the bank and other companies you trust asking for personal information or even banking codes.
Things to look out for
Check the grammar and spelling
Are there sloppy spelling mistakes or poor grammar? This can be a big giveaway of a scam email. A real bank or company would not make mistakes.
Be wary of links in the email
Our emails will always contain one piece of personally identifiable information, like a partial postcode or name so that you can identify it's genuine. They may contain links to our websites, but they’ll never contain links that take you to a page that ask for any online banking details, like your customer number, password or card reader codes.
Do they push you to act quickly?
Scare tactics are often used by scammers to make you worry so you’ll act without thinking it through. By taking a moment to think whether the email is genuine, you can stop yourself from playing into the scammers hands:
They will threaten your account.
Is your account being threatened? No bank will close your account if you don’t do what they say.
Is there a prize?
They may make promises of prizes and awards to fool you into giving away confidential and private information
Steps to protect yourself
Fraudsters will ask for personal details that the bank or other real companies will never ask for. They may also ask you to take actions that seem suspicious.
- 01
Never hand over your Online Banking login details, activation codes, card reader codes, mobile app codes or PIN numbers
- 02
Don't send money to an account you don't know or trust
- 03
Be cautious when clicking links.
Social engineering
Social engineering is the way fraudsters manipulate people so that they hand over personal information.
Fake telephone calls
Fraudsters call often pretending to be from the bank and encourage you to give your personal details, such as PIN, Mobile Banking and card reader codes.
Security centre
Our hub for all things fraud and scam related. Find out the latest trends