HUNTSVILLE, Ala. (WHNT) — The Better Business Bureau of North Alabama is advising everyone to watch out for a scam that involves the popular mobile wallet Zelle. Scammers pretend to be with your bank, then trick you into transferring your hard-earned money to them.
The money transfer app was supposed to be safer than all the others because it’s run by the nation’s largest banks like Chase, Bank of America and Wells Fargo. However, Zelle is fast becoming the number one tool for scammers.
Huntsville resident Katherine Bucy received a phone call from a scammer just minutes after she walked out of the bank.
“Suddenly my phone rang,” Bucy told News 19. “It said it was from Wells Fargo customer service, so I answered it.”
The person on the other end said that someone was trying to send themselves thousands of dollars from her account. Bucy, a single mother with a full-time job and attending school, gave them the information they needed to protect the account.
“I put in my own phone number and my name,” Bucy continued. “That was all it took and once I hit send that money was then sent to an outside bank account.”
Ann Durham received a text message from what she thought was her bank offering fraud protection.
“He said all we need you to do is your new phone has been leaked and we need you to turn off your phone number in your Zelle,” Durham told News 19.
In both cases, it was an elaborate scam, one that asked you to give information to your bank account.
Elizabeth Garcia with the Better Business Bureau of North Alabama says fraudsters are using the popular banking industry money app to make millions of dollars with this scam. It’s difficult to detect because the app is already associated with your bank account.
“When the consumer authorizes that transaction through Zelle… then the scammer makes off with the money and then the consumer is left to rectify that with the bank and try to get that money back by making a fraud claim,” Garcia explained.
“Clearly I want my money back,” Bucy concluded. “There are people out there in the world that if they were to lose this amount of money it would be devastating for them.”
The Better Business Bureau says that a sure way to divert the scammers is to consistently change the password on your Zelle app account and register that app using a two-factor authentication because it makes the app more difficult to access.
