Re: "'Scammers stole £40k after EDF gave out my number"

On 2025-03-06 19:53, Java Jive wrote:

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On 2025-03-06 16:37, Brian Gregory wrote:

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On 06/03/2025 13:54, Java Jive wrote:

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But how would they know which banks, savings accounts, etc, to target without additional information?

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They're hackers after money. They are not lazy. They try them one by one. Why would you think they wouldn’t bother to do that?

 Doesn't sound likely to me, they want the money, but they wouldn't want to take unnecessary risks of getting caught, and randomly trying banks and financial organisations without the necessary identifying information such as account numbers would likely fail, and perhaps cause the police to be contacted.

It seems very likely that I was correct.  Rereading the original BBC report, there is a single sentence which most of us seem to have missed on first reading ...
"O2 Virgin Media confirmed the scammer telephoned its call centre requesting a new Sim and had hacked Stephen's emails."
... so, as I had supposed, they were reading the victim's emails, and that is how they knew:
    -  His various account details;
    -  There was enough in them to be worth setting up the SIM swap scam.
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