Jono, Ben & Megan - The Podcast - BONUS: We Are In A Scam-Demic and Here Is How To Help!

Episode Date: June 7, 2023

100,000 people in NZ fell for a scam so we get the experts on to help out!See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

The Hits, the Jono and Ben podcast. There's a big scam going around, you would have heard it. It's all over the news yesterday, including on 7sharp. The scammers are having a field day right now and more and more of us are getting sucked in. You may have had a fake text pretending to be from NZTA telling you about an unpaid road toll. It's a scam that's been doing the rounds for months

and Internal Affairs is desperately trying to find out who's behind it. Over 100,000 Kiwis have fallen victim to this uh very complex scam that's going around yeah i think it needs to be pointed out too that it's not just old geriatrics like me getting stiffed is it now anyone no one is safe i know uh producer joel you're saying your friend his instagram account got hacked and they started posting wild stuff and demanding money for them to hand the password back, right? And they really, they sound real. I knew because I was living with them, but his family members who are a little bit older as well, they just thought it was him asking for a hundred bucks to his bank and stuff.

Yeah. And he had some pretty extreme views on politics as well. Those are her. Those are his actual legit views, views i think as well uh but just to halo who's with us now you fell for the scam too yes sorry hey they they got me quite good um obviously the accent says i'm aussie so i've never driven on toll roads before in new zealand first time i did it all just added up perfectly because six days later i got this text saying that i need to pay for a

toll road and I was like wow that's so good that the like the government contacts you directly like they're onto it you're even grateful grateful for the text I was like gotcha I'll pay it now it's a dollar twenty so I clicked the link popped my details in and then went to the gym and then an hour later ASB calls me I was like, oh, so you've been scammed? And they got me, what's that, $1,800. Oh, so they took it? Yeah, they took it and then a block was put on my card and six weeks later still waiting for a card. And see, how old are you?

26. 26. See, this is happening to the young. Now, what we also didn't tell you, another customer in this country as well, every day you come to work, you do actually pay the co-host. You work with. Was it $15?

Yeah. Is that the current rate? Just like a tax? Yeah, just daily. Just a daily thing. I mean, we both got the same text the other day,

didn't we? Which about a job opportunity. Yeah. See, I'm not sure what the scam was in that, but you just like, you're suddenly like, ah.

It just said, hello, darling. Yeah. It's, you know, Chantel from the HR department. I'm like,

well, Chantel's pretty relaxed on her. She's from the hr department i'm like well chantelle's pretty relaxed on her yeah she's from the hr i couldn't get the scam on that one but i didn't want to click through to any more details no one's called me darling in years i'll click anything give you anything but that's the thing i think taylor you're right you get you at the moment where you think well this is feasible it's like the courier ones as well you're like oh i'm waiting for a package and i'm just going to pay a little bit for customs to come through and then suddenly you're doing it you're entering in your details,

and then they're taking money out of your accounts. Yeah, I just patrol the internet like a maximum security prison. You feel like you can get shanked at any moment. Someone's always there to screw you over. And that's the problem because they're getting so good and so convincing, the emails, texts, whatever you receive, that you don't actually trust legitimate emails that come through now. As I said, I had a WhatsApp message from a legitimate courier company,

and I was like, why would they be messaging me on WhatsApp? I'm not going to reply to that. They did it again. Then someone called me going, hey, you haven't actually replied to this message. It was a legit one, but you have so many fake ones. You don't do anything about it. I had a WhatsApp message from a lady claiming to be my mum saying hi jay we've arrived at the airport can you please come pick us up you're like scam scam it was two weeks ago still there from here again they have you must

have been not gonna get one over me old lady yeah so in the next 10 minutes we're gonna find out what can happen if you are scammed and what you can do but we'd love to hear your stories have you been caught up have you been caught up in a romance we're not going to mock or ridicule because as we say it's you know anyone is vulnerable nowadays uh financial scams romance scams pyramid schemes whatever yeah well things that we can all help out each each other and things that we can look out for um so if you can share your story we'd love to hear from you this morning. Talking scams this morning as over 100,000 Kiwis have been caught up in this latest scam. It's a

tech scam that comes through from the NZTA. It's not actually NZTA, Waka Kotahi. But it's tricked over 100,000 Kiwis and some have sadly lost their entire life savings to the scam. Oh, that is, yeah, that's really sad to hear. Ruby, you're on from Tauranga. Actually, she, Ruby, you were part to the scam. Oh, that is, yeah, that's really sad to hear. Ruby, you're on from Tauranga.

Actually, she, Ruby, you were part of this scam. Kia ora, guys. How are you? Kia ora to you. Now, you and your husband both received this message from Waka Kotahi. Yeah, it was an email, and it was asking for, like it was saying that we needed to update our car registration.

So I could see it was asking for, like it was saying that we needed to update our car registration. So I could see it was a scam because it was like full of spelling errors and the sender was like ABC 123 or something. So I deleted it and then asked him if he received it. He said, oh, yeah, I just paid it. And I was like, shit, no. You're like us idiot husbands, eh? so what happened i know um so he rang his bank quickly um and they could see there was a transaction on there for like 87 or something um pending to an overseas bank account and then underneath it there was three or four more um transactions for the same amount. So they cancelled them all.

But yeah, they told them that that's how they do it. They start with a small amount and then they try and get more and more of it. Jeez, and spare a thought for the poor scammer too who thought they had a fish on the line as well. Nearly got one across the line there, but thankfully Ruby was on to it as well. And there are probably little details you can look out for. I remember I got sent a text going, here's your package, P-U-C-K-A-G-E. Just send us your credit card detalles. And obviously, I sent my detalles over. It's the sensible thing to do.

Ruby, you're going to have a great day, mate. Cool. Thanks. You too, guys. Appreciate it. We'll hit the mungify. Eric, you've been scammed. What was it with there, Eric? Hey, boys. How we going? Good to have you on, mate. Cool. Thanks. You too, guys. Appreciate it. We'll hit the monger fire. Eric, you've been scammed. What was it with there, Eric?

Hey, boys. How we going? Yeah, good to have you on, mate. What was it with? So it wasn't a traditional text one like that's been going around. It was actually an airfare site that I had bought in tickets to go back to see my family in America. And then I went to check my boarding pass, and it was not on the Air New Zealand website.

And I Googled the name and realized I had been scammed. So what they do, it's called Skyscanner. I went on Skyscanner. It's called SmartFares. So I went online, and just all the things that talk about it were saying scam. So I ended up having to go to the Better Business Bureau in America and file a formal complaint. And then that's the only way I was able to get a refund back. Wow.

So you did get your money back and you got your flights? I did, but I think a lot of people didn't know that, so a lot of people just got scammed and had to buy other tickets. So what they do is they never buy the original ticket, and then they tell you that the original one's been cancelled and ask you to pay more money to get a new one. Ah. I was going to say, when you first did,

I went on a site called Sky Scammer. I was like, well, there's some I went on a site called Sky Scammer I was like well there's some alarm bells there it's Scanner there's a site called Sky Scanner that gives you

the cheapest flights and this site was on there and I've used Sky Scanner before so I thought it'd be legit and I don't know

how they're allowed to be on there it's crazy yeah it is it feels like no one's going to get caught how can you

catch them yeah Eric doesn't have the answers clearly no I haven't got the answers as well it is worrying No one's going to get caught. How can you catch them? Yeah, exactly. Eric doesn't have the answers, clearly. No, I haven't got the answers as well. It is worrying at times. They just seem to be relentless at the moment, more and more. And you just, you know, your guard's down and you trip up and it happens. So what do you do if it happens?

Well, I'll tell you what you do is you go to NetSafe and you get them on the radio. Next, we're going to talk to NetSafe. Sean from NetSafe, what happens if you get scammed? What can you do? Are these people going to get caught and what you need to look out for? 100,000 Kiwis have been scammed recently from the latest NZTA scam that seems to be hitting people's phones, people's emails as well.

We wanted to know what you could do if you were scammed. And we've got someone that is an expert from NetSafe. Sean, good morning. How's things? I'm good, Matt. How are you? We're doing all right. Thanks so much for joining us this morning.

A bit worrying at the moment. There's so many Kiwis. It seems like more and more, but over 100,000 Kiwis getting scammed by this latest NZTA scam. Yeah, well, again, it is a worry. I think you don't have to go very far to work out and find someone in your life that's probably received one of these and worse, probably sent some money off. So yeah, it is definitely a worry.

Okay, so I've received it. I've clicked on it. I've done whatever I need to do. They've got into my bits and pieces. Where to now? In your bits and pieces is never a good thing. And that's where the problem lies. I don't even want anyone one of my bits and pieces.

If you've given them, if you've made a transaction, if you've given them money, if that's what they asked you to do, then whatever you paid with, you've got to consider that to be at risk. So if it's a credit card, you need to talk to your bank and cancel it. If you're in a bank transfer, same deal. Talk to whoever it was that you did that transaction with if you gave them details about yourself so if they were asking for passport number your driver's license number your home address whatever those things are then you need to be now a little more cautious around

any emails or text you might have that use those details and pretend to be from your bank or the government or the police or whoever it is and think really cautiously about it. When you get those messages, think, is this really the bank or the police or whoever just because they've got those details, knowing that you might have given those details to somebody a little bit dodgy just a few days before. Do you think these scams are getting more complex or just more believable or are they just happening more frequently?

Unfortunately, it's all of the above. We are definitely seeing more of them. They've always changed rapidly and that's the problem. And they are getting better at it. So the old thing we used to rely on when you read through it and it was in terribly poorly written English or dodgy logos that were all squashed up and looking wrong, those days have gone, unfortunately. We can't rely on that because these scams, some of them, you almost can't tell the difference between that and the real organisation. That's the thing, I just don't trust anyone now. In real life, online, anywhere.

My trust, it's all gone. But whatever happened to the glory days of scamming? You had your lonely Nigerian prince just wanting to deposit his inheritance. Well, you know, we knew their game. A couple of drongos fell for it. We had a laugh, we moved on, you know. But it's becoming, feels like a torrent.

How do the officials stop it? Oh yeah, that guy, that Nigerian prince, he is sitting in the end of a bar somewhere shaking his head thinking where where did all the good days go um because it is a different game you know it's um that there's a lot more chance it seems that there are you know it's organized crime behind this um these are not individuals thinking right i'm going to write this email and i'm going to get a whole load of uh a whole lot of money as a result there are call centers that run round the clock. There are people prepared to run romance scams

for really long periods of time to try and hook somebody in before they try and grab any money. So, yes, it is difficult, and it really basically relies on all of our vigilance, all of us to say, you know, kind of stop, take a breath before we take any actions and talk to each other about these things. So, you know we're if we're caught up in something we think it's exciting be it romance be an investment whatever it is that we think wow this is this is really worth me you know putting

my name on the dotted line or sending my credit card off for before we take that step talk to someone else who's not so emotionally involved you know talk to a friend family member ring ring that say give us a call, run it past us. There's very few of these things that we haven't seen. We've got an 0508 phone number, 0508 NetSafe. Send us an email on help at netsafe.org.nz. Whatever it takes, just get to us and check. We'll be that trusted friend for you.

And obviously you want the credit card and the three-digit pin as well on that email, Sean. If you can give us both numbers from your driver's license, that would be helpful. Yeah, great, great. It's all about board. Yeah, yeah. Do you think there's, I mean,

obviously there's a certain amount of embarrassment if you get duped as well. You know, like I imagine there's those sorts of feelings. Especially romance. And you probably don't want to tell people about when you get scammed. No, and look, that's the other big part of the problem is because so many people do feel embarrassed because, you know, some of us think there's a certain type of person that

gets scammed and, you know, it's just not the case. The right person for a scam is the right person at that time, you know. You guys have got the best job in the world, so you guys aren't falling for an investment and employment scam. But if I hate my boss, then I might be. You guys have got the best job in the world, so you guys aren't falling for an employment scam. But if I hate my boss, then I might be. So that the two of us could get the same message. Nothing to you means an awful lot to me.

Hey, Sean, well, listen, it's been really interesting. We'd love to keep in touch with you, mate. And it's an ongoing issue, and thanks for all the hard work you're doing at Netsafe. Oh, well, a pleasure. I'm more than happy to help any time we can, guys.