A member of Leicestershire County Council’s cabinet has spoken out to warn people to beware of a scam currently doing the rounds – after he almost fell for it himself.
Ozzy O’Shea – a former police officer and magistrate – is cabinet member for highways and transport, and represents Groby and Ratby.
He has issued the warning after nearly falling victim to a scam where fraudsters hacked into a number of his online accounts and attempted to change the passwords, before calling him pretending to be from his bank.
The worrying events started when Ozzy was sent a message from his email provider to say his password had been changed, as well as the password to his late wife’s email account. He then received notifications from his Amazon and National Lottery accounts that someone had tried to access them.
He then discovered that there had been attempts to get into this ISA and bank accounts.
“I was very concerned, because I hadn’t changed any passwords and realise that I had been hacked,” he said.
“I immediately called the providers of my accounts and added two-step security to all those that didn’t already have it. Luckily, it was already in place on my Amazon, ISA and bank accounts, so the scammers didn’t manage to get anything.”
But that wasn’t the end of the story – Ozzy then received a call from a man claiming to be from his bank.
The man addressed Ozzy by his full name, told him he wasn’t going to ask any security questions and then asked him to confirm his address.
At this point, Ozzy realised he was being scammed and challenged the caller, who put the phone down.
Ozzy said: “I want to warn people that no matter who you are, this sort of scam can happen to you. Luckily, I am well aware of scams, as I write articles about them each month in my local magazine, and as a retired police officer, I have dealt with issues like this in the past.
“Please be careful when talking to anyone who calls you, and be careful about passing on your details online. I would recommend everyone to set up two-step security on all their accounts and to never give details to people who call you out of the blue. If it can happen to me, it can happen to anybody.”
Leicestershire Trading Standards officers praised Ozzy for speaking out about the attempted scam, and urged residents to protect themselves from falling victim to hacking scams and cold calling fraud with just a few simple steps:
- If you are called out of the blue, never confirm any details or security questions
- Don’t assume the call is genuine, just because the caller has a bit of information about you
- If in doubt, end the call and contact your bank or service provider, using a number you have got from another source, such as online or from a statement or bill. Do not call back on the number the caller has given you
- Never give out personal information or financial details
- If your accounts have been hacked, call your service provider straight away
- Change all passwords on all your accounts, and never use the same password for multiple accounts
- Set up two-step verification
- You can report scams to the Citizens Advice Consumer Helpline on 0808 223 1133 or Action Fraud on 0300 123 2040
This type of scam is very common and can target anyone, so we want to warn people to be on their guard to make sure they’re not caught out by it.
Taking just a few simple steps to protect data and information – as well as making sure never to give out personal and financial details to cold callers – can make a big difference and help to foil these unscrupulous criminals.
Councillor Deborah Taylor, lead member for regulatory services
Watch a short video where Ozzy talks about his experience.