Speaker 1: Welcome to the Friends with Money Podcast, brought to you
Speaker 1: by Money Magazine, creating financial freedom for Australians since nineteen
Speaker 1: ninety nine.
Speaker 2: Hello and thanks again for joining us for another episode
Speaker 2: of the Friends with Money Podcast. It's Michelle Baltazar here,
Speaker 2: editor in chief at Money Magazine. Thank you for joining us.
Speaker 2: A year ago, we did an episode on how to
Speaker 2: avoid online scams, and we'll share the link to that
Speaker 2: again in the show notes. Today we want to expand
Speaker 2: on this topic by finding out what to do if
Speaker 2: you've lost money to a SCAMMA despite your best efforts,
Speaker 2: how do you recover from the financial loss? What do
Speaker 2: you do in the first forty eight hours after discovering
Speaker 2: that you've been a victim of an online scam? If
Speaker 2: you stick with us until the end of this episode,
Speaker 2: we'll also share what is the new government law that
Speaker 2: could be introduced by the end of this year to
Speaker 2: catch cyber criminals before they can get to your bank account.
Speaker 2: So with us today to talk about online scams and
Speaker 2: what to do is Helen Baker, a licensed Australian financial
Speaker 2: advisor with more than fifteen years experience informing her work.
Speaker 2: Helen has completed a master's in financial planning and a
Speaker 2: master's in Innovation and Change on top of her accounting degree.
Speaker 2: Helen has also authored three books on becoming financially savvy,
Speaker 2: including the book on Your Own Two Feet, The Essential
Speaker 2: Guide to Financial Independence for All Women. Helen, thank you
Speaker 2: for joining us.
Speaker 3: Thank you hello. Now this is very.
Speaker 2: Topical for us because in the absence of making extra
Speaker 2: income right now, we want to know how can we
Speaker 2: protect the money that we already have. So tell me
Speaker 2: a little bit more. Why are you so passionate about
Speaker 2: talking to people and educating them about online scams?
Speaker 4: Well, I think we not any of the scams, but
Speaker 4: any kind of INFI that you made. The sense of
Speaker 4: loss is felt way more than if you have a
Speaker 4: great win or a great upside. All your investments are
Speaker 4: increasing and for a lot of people there's just no
Speaker 4: time to recover. And they I think the thought is, oh,
Speaker 4: you know, Australians are rich, They've got a lot of these.
Speaker 3: Things, but our cost of living is very high.
Speaker 4: It's very different here to other countries in terms of
Speaker 4: the cost of housing and so on. So you know,
Speaker 4: losing some money is really quite detrimental to a lot
Speaker 4: of people. And one of the big passions obviously is
Speaker 4: for women. We have forty thousand women living out of
Speaker 4: cars in Australia, which is horrific, and we do not
Speaker 4: need to be adding to that total.
Speaker 2: Yes, and I think we have to define what kind
Speaker 2: of scams we are talking about. There is obviously the
Speaker 2: fake bill scam, where people might lose anywhere between two
Speaker 2: hundred and one thousand dollars, But the one that I'd
Speaker 2: like to talk to in particular is when people lose
Speaker 2: as much as eighteen thousand dollars fifty thousand dollars. This
Speaker 2: could be someone sending their home deposit to the wrong
Speaker 2: bank account, or someone giving their money to a term
Speaker 2: deposit company that turned out to be fake. I mean,
Speaker 2: we're really getting serious now about how much cyber criminals
Speaker 2: are making.
Speaker 3: One hundred percent, and that's the biggest issue.
Speaker 4: I think it's because they only need to catch one
Speaker 4: or two on these really big amounts, and they're like
Speaker 4: life changing for them as well, just as much as
Speaker 4: their life changing for people on the other side.
Speaker 2: So let's focus on this one case study. I read
Speaker 2: in the National Anti Scam Center website that this person John,
Speaker 2: he's a small business owner, He has a supplier based
Speaker 2: in China. He got an email saying for the next invoice,
Speaker 2: can you please transfer the amount to this account and
Speaker 2: a true story. He sent them thirty two thousand dollars,
Speaker 2: didn't get the goods. After two weeks came back and said,
Speaker 2: well where is it? And that's when he discovered that
Speaker 2: money's gone. So let's talk about the first forty eight
Speaker 2: hours after you've been scammed.
Speaker 3: What do you do?
Speaker 4: Yeah, so the first forty eight hours is obviously, do
Speaker 4: not put your head in the sand. There's a sense,
Speaker 4: as a victim of any crime that it's only happened
Speaker 4: to me, and there's a shame attached to it. You must, must,
Speaker 4: must get on the front foot as fast as possible.
Speaker 4: Time is of the essence here, and what banks and
Speaker 4: institutions are looking at now is starting to slow down
Speaker 4: this transfer of money. So instead of being instant and
Speaker 4: we sometimes get frustrated because something didn't move overnight, it's
Speaker 4: actually there somewhat now for our protection. Can take up
Speaker 4: to four days. So these kind of delays allow you
Speaker 4: sometime to get in contact with the institution and help
Speaker 4: them become aware that this is an issue and see
Speaker 4: what they can do.
Speaker 3: To try and get as much money back as possible.
Speaker 2: I must trust that that is a very important change
Speaker 2: in the last twelve months, where in the past there's
Speaker 2: that sense of within three hours your money's gone, But
Speaker 2: now banks are holding those funds for as long as
Speaker 2: a couple of days I believe in some cases, So
Speaker 2: you do have that chance to recoup your money.
Speaker 3: Yes, depending on which the institution is.
Speaker 4: So if you look at different organizations that are not
Speaker 4: linked directly to a bank, so it could be, for example,
Speaker 4: like certain superannuation or investment organizations, then they're slightly different.
Speaker 4: But the banks in the back end have AI, they
Speaker 4: have people talking.
Speaker 3: To each other, they're cross referencing with each other. So
Speaker 3: there are things.
Speaker 4: Happening out there to try and protect and try and
Speaker 4: delay the money, but you need to pick it up
Speaker 4: quickly obviously.
Speaker 2: All right, now, do you get the police involved or
Speaker 2: is there a government agency that you need to call
Speaker 2: once you've discovered that you've been scammed.
Speaker 4: Yeah, so you can go to the a Triple C
Speaker 4: scam Watch and obviously logs, so that that's you know,
Speaker 4: we're protecting other people and getting the messages out there
Speaker 4: as well. Police is good as well, and also getting
Speaker 4: onto lawyers if it's something to do with some sort
Speaker 4: of loans or documents that you've signed. So getting as
Speaker 4: much support as you possibly can from all the relevant
Speaker 4: organizations is what you need to do to shut this
Speaker 4: thing down as quickly as possible.
Speaker 2: And try and help others avoid suffering from the same feet.
Speaker 3: I think that's right.
Speaker 4: You know, as a community people, the more that this continues,
Speaker 4: the more people there are at risk. And obviously some
Speaker 4: are more vulnerable than others, but we often think it's
Speaker 4: certain demographics that are going to get caught by these scams,
Speaker 4: but it's.
Speaker 3: Actually across the board.
Speaker 4: And one of the biggest shoes is actually time people
Speaker 4: are clicking on things because we're in a hurry, we're busy,
Speaker 4: we're half checking these things or it seems like it
Speaker 4: makes sense, And I think we need to be more
Speaker 4: vigilant about doing more work up front before we're clicking
Speaker 4: on any kind of button to send money anywhere, because
Speaker 4: we know that at some point statistically that something is
Speaker 4: going to come through that it's not trustworthy.
Speaker 2: I know. I'm just going to throw in a couple
Speaker 2: of stats here. Last year, more than six hundred thousand
Speaker 2: scams were reported to the A Triple C and we
Speaker 2: lost a staggering two point seventy four billion. So I
Speaker 2: did a rough calculation here, and it's literally every day
Speaker 2: there would be more than two thousand scams reported. So
Speaker 2: you're right that you're not alone. This has unfortunately has
Speaker 2: become the new norm. So okay, so we know that
Speaker 2: the first forty eight hours is crucial. Now, how can
Speaker 2: you secure your other accounts because often we have multiple
Speaker 2: bank accounts, or we may have other kind of bills
Speaker 2: where the passwords are the same.
Speaker 4: Yeah, exactly right, So there is that generic password that
Speaker 4: gets transferred from one to the other. And there's been
Speaker 4: a lot of talk about changing passwords, but if someone's
Speaker 4: been hacked in, they can see what's inside to some
Speaker 4: of these things as well, so you might have any
Speaker 4: kind of password. The issue is more about building in
Speaker 4: these next levels, so rather than just being one way
Speaker 4: of clicking on a password, clicking into something and moving forward.
Speaker 4: So you want to look at where there are organizations,
Speaker 4: and a lot of organizations, particularly the banks and the institutions,
Speaker 4: are moving speedily on two factor authentication, which means you
Speaker 4: know you'll get something through and then you'll get a
Speaker 4: special code that will only come to your phone or
Speaker 4: to an app that is on your phone. And again,
Speaker 4: these various levels of these institutions are building because at
Speaker 4: some point they're going to work out ways and I
Speaker 4: already have in some way they can get to your
Speaker 4: phone number that picks up the authenticator as well. So
Speaker 4: there's more and more of these protection mechanisms being built
Speaker 4: in order to protect your money and to protect the
Speaker 4: institutions as well.
Speaker 2: All right, And the good news is that I think
Speaker 2: we're all now getting used to two factor authentication. This
Speaker 2: happens a lot now and thankfully banks are also becoming
Speaker 2: more proactive where they do try and encourage two factor
Speaker 2: Sometimes it could be the biometrics ID, which is great
Speaker 2: if you're the only person using your phone, so that's
Speaker 2: a great way to do that as well. Now, you
Speaker 2: mentioned earlier the emotional kind of whiplash really from losing
Speaker 2: tens of thousands of dollars, and it's anecdotal that some
Speaker 2: people don't even want to talk about it. Instead, they
Speaker 2: want to make up for what they lost by gambling,
Speaker 2: maybe using credit cards, or resorting to anything but telling
Speaker 2: their family and friends that they've just lost a substantial amount.
Speaker 2: What do you think they should do?
Speaker 4: Yes, it is again back to this issue of victims
Speaker 4: of crime, where the victims feel like, you know, they're
Speaker 4: the ones that should be shamed, when it's actually the
Speaker 4: other way around. So I think being transparent is really key.
Speaker 4: You need to be careful not to get into more
Speaker 4: debt by doing these things, or in some cases people
Speaker 4: might go, well, you know, I was I've retired or
Speaker 4: I was going to retire. Now I need to start
Speaker 4: doing all these different things to boost my super backup
Speaker 4: or my investments back up. And the risk with that,
Speaker 4: obviously is you get scammed in a very different way
Speaker 4: and you you know, the whole get rich quick schemes
Speaker 4: where it might not be done in the fashion that
Speaker 4: it came through this way, but it'll be done in
Speaker 4: a different way where you promise something that's not really
Speaker 4: realistic to be delivered, but you sign up for it
Speaker 4: because on that I've got to recover. I've got to
Speaker 4: recover into that panic. So you need to consider. This
Speaker 4: is where probably the financial advice component is a necessity,
Speaker 4: or a financial counselor as well, what are the things
Speaker 4: that you should be looking at to do now in
Speaker 4: order to rebuild yourself from that if the money has
Speaker 4: actually be gone and it's not recoverable.
Speaker 2: Yeah, so I know that in previous episodes we've talked
Speaker 2: about accessing legal aid or community legal centers if you
Speaker 2: can't afford a lawyer to try and recool your money.
Speaker 2: I also know that one thing that we've said to
Speaker 2: people who couldn't afford their mortgage repayments, for example, because
Speaker 2: you just miss one month of mortgage repayment and suddenly
Speaker 2: your credit score is affected, et cetera, do you think
Speaker 2: they should access hardship provisions or is it covered by
Speaker 2: insurance at all? When you lose there's money? What are
Speaker 2: the other options here?
Speaker 3: Yeah, that's a great question.
Speaker 4: I was talking to a general insurance broker about this
Speaker 4: the other week because I was saying, you know, we
Speaker 4: talk about it from a business perspective about cybersecurity and
Speaker 4: insuring businesses, but it's you know what about people insuring
Speaker 4: for themselves just based on the statistics and the vulnerability
Speaker 4: of people to get caught. So there are some insurances
Speaker 4: that are out there's we're talking to.
Speaker 3: A GI broker.
Speaker 4: Sorry, GI's code for general insurance broker to start to
Speaker 4: look at those kind of things. Some of the institutions
Speaker 4: for which your embedded will maybe have insurance that does
Speaker 4: cover you, but it's pretty hard if you've clicked on
Speaker 4: certain things because once you've clicked on those, it's kind
Speaker 4: of like it's not their responsibility anymore and it moves
Speaker 4: away from that. So I think understanding what the parameters
Speaker 4: are around having some sort of insurance so that you
Speaker 4: understand when you are covered in when you're not.
Speaker 3: Just like a house, you know, if it's flooded and
Speaker 3: you don't.
Speaker 4: Have flood insurance, well, or you do, but something's happened
Speaker 4: it's not being managed in an appropriate way. So again,
Speaker 4: the detail of all of those things are really really important.
Speaker 2: Again, I'll just repeat that you want to talk to
Speaker 2: a GI broker, a general insurance broker, just to look
Speaker 2: at your options if it's relevant to you, and to
Speaker 2: seek professional financial advice if that is also the case
Speaker 2: where the stakes are really high, if you're a small
Speaker 2: business owner, or if it's just you're reliant on just
Speaker 2: one income. So finally, we've talked about the first forty
Speaker 2: eight hours, Now what about in the long term. So
Speaker 2: we've got this person, they've just lost thirty two thousand
Speaker 2: dollars fifty thousand dollars. What can they do in the
Speaker 2: next five years after?
Speaker 4: Yeah, so I think it's going back to the absolute
Speaker 4: basics about how do I build wealth, which goes back
Speaker 4: to you know, what am I earning?
Speaker 3: What can I have on my spending that makes sense?
Speaker 4: How do I then invest this surplus that I hopefully
Speaker 4: have to try and rebuild my wealth? Do I put
Speaker 4: it into super do I put it in another investment,
Speaker 4: do I pay off my home?
Speaker 3: What do I do? What's right for now? What's right can.
Speaker 4: Be different in future years, can mean you know, for
Speaker 4: some people unfortunately having to go out and get that
Speaker 4: second job or that extra way to earn income. It's
Speaker 4: looking at a range of different ways to recoup what
Speaker 4: you've lost or adjusting to the fact that it has lost.
Speaker 4: But what does that mean over the long term for you?
Speaker 4: What are you willing to compromise about what your future
Speaker 4: looked like because of what's happened here? So it will
Speaker 4: always depend on whether you're working, how old you are,
Speaker 4: what you already have, and about doing the smarts that
Speaker 4: stretch your money further as much as possible.
Speaker 2: What if you're a self funded retiree.
Speaker 3: If you're a self funded retiree, depending on the amount
Speaker 3: that's low, you might want to talk to sentlink about
Speaker 3: now whether you do qualify for some sort of age
Speaker 3: pension or part pension or something similar that's in that vein.
Speaker 4: Whether it's careers or so on. So it will depend
Speaker 4: on what the amount of money is. And again it's
Speaker 4: always looking at what are these things that I don't know,
Speaker 4: I don't know, and getting the support around you from
Speaker 4: those who will care about your situation and try and
Speaker 4: help you to rebuild as much as you can or stabilize.
Speaker 3: Where you're at for your future so you still feel safe.
Speaker 2: All right, So at least you know that there is
Speaker 2: the option to look at part or full pension if
Speaker 2: you're a self funded retire and you've just lost your money,
Speaker 2: especially on investment scams. By the end of the year,
Speaker 2: the consumer regulator is looking at forcing Internet companies to
Speaker 2: proactively stop hosting scams or else they'll face hety fines
Speaker 2: or an An example on this is that AI trading
Speaker 2: platforms that are advertising and it's endorsed by deep fake
Speaker 2: images of Andrew Forrest the mining magnet, or it could
Speaker 2: even be Elon Musk for example. So if any of
Speaker 2: these Internet companies, whether it's Facebook or it could be
Speaker 2: a gold Daddy site that is hosting a domain that
Speaker 2: is false, they could face fines up to fifty million dollars.
Speaker 2: So this really shows that there are big bucks swirling
Speaker 2: around online scams these days.
Speaker 3: Yeah, and I'd just like to comment as well.
Speaker 4: I think while we're talking about this, it would be
Speaker 4: really good if the government applied pressure or the institutions
Speaker 4: applied pressure about who is holding what information. There is
Speaker 4: a lot of our personal information that is being held
Speaker 4: by organizations who just do not need to be holding
Speaker 4: that information. You know, you can go sign up for
Speaker 4: something even like one thing. I signed up for tickets
Speaker 4: the other day for a band, and it wanted my
Speaker 4: date of birth. Like I understand they're trying to check
Speaker 4: if you're over eighteen, but you know you shouldn't be
Speaker 4: holding all of that information because there's no guarantee from
Speaker 4: any organization that you can't be hacked. So I think
Speaker 4: we need to rethink what information is being stored by anybody,
Speaker 4: whether it's your doctor, whether it's the the optometrists, whether
Speaker 4: it's the ticket master, whether it's who is holding all
Speaker 4: of my information, even phone plans everything.
Speaker 3: Understand that that's to do with credit. But you know, once.
Speaker 4: You've got it, why are you not forced to delete
Speaker 4: that information? You know, we as financial advisors are not
Speaker 4: able to hold our client's tax phone number, which is great,
Speaker 4: like there's a protection there for all our clients. So
Speaker 4: and that's another thing I would say as well. One
Speaker 4: of the great things that financial advisors are doing is
Speaker 4: becoming a war for their clients so that our clients
Speaker 4: can contact us about you know, I got this, is
Speaker 4: it legitimate or not? And that's one of the great
Speaker 4: things I think that financial advisors are plugging and protecting
Speaker 4: for their clients, something that's probably not promoted very much,
Speaker 4: but it's a great value add because protecting from a
Speaker 4: mistake is way way, way better than the cost of
Speaker 4: a mistake.
Speaker 2: Absolutely well said once again, Helene, thank you for joining us.
Speaker 3: You are very welcome. Thank you for having me.
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Speaker 2: next Michelle Baltasar bye for now.
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