You’re just going about your day when you get a text from your bank’s fraud department, asking if you made a transaction. Of course, you don’t recognize the transaction, so you text back “no”. In response, the bank texts you letting you know that you will be called shortly.

And you are.

The bank goes through their verification process to make sure you are who you say you are.

After that, the caller will most often go over some transactions with you. You’ll recognize none of them. The caller might ask you to give them your password, or have you download a program so they can remove into your machine. Or they will just tell you that your account has been compromised and to make sure your money is safe, you have to transfer it somehow.

Maybe they’ll ask you to transfer it via one of the money transfer apps. Or give you directions on how to wire it to another account. Or have you take money out of the account and transfer it to bitcoin.

Once you’ve done any of the above and the caller has hung up, you find that there was no fraud on your account, it has not been compromised, and you’ve sent pretty much everything - if not everything - to a scammer.

How to protect yourself
Most banks will send out an automated alert when they suspect fraud, but these alerts usually just are “please call this number or the number on the back of your card”. Any legit customer service or fraud person will certainly not take offense if you prefer to call a verified number. Please note that some scammers will send out a similar alert but with a fake number, trusting that the victim will be too lazy to look up the right number - always verify you’re calling a legit number for your bank!

Definitely don’t give an unknown, unverified caller your personal information!

In addition, investigators have access to an array of tools to both investigate a situation and remedy it. A legitimate investigator doesn’t need you to do anything other than verify whether or not the payments on your account were made by you. They do not need your help in accessing your account, and they certainly don’t need you to manually move your money anywhere - they have tools for that!

(And of course, never ever let a random person convince you to download a remote access tool and let them access your computer.)