BEWARE BT PASSCODE BEING USED BY SCAMMERS - HOW BT COULD CHANGE THEIR EMAIL TO PREVENT SCAMMERS

[TimCurtis]

@TB3 

I had the exact same experience recently and because of the passcode part I believed it to be BT. Mine was via my mobile in the form of a text message but other than that it was identical.

Turns out that if they try to change your password on the account the system will send the passcode and that lets you change the password - or them change it in this case.

Having spoken to BT on the security side I now know that it's only if YOU call BT that you'll get passcode sent legitimately , other than the password change process.

No severe damage was done in my case but worrying nevertheless.

[TB3]

Thank you for your reply.

I think BT could help their customers by just adding "for your password" after "your passcode is ...." 

I have suggested this to the Fraud Team at BT but whether anyone picks this suggestion up - who knows.... 

[WSH]

Sadly, it’s not a new technique but I like your suggestion of making the email more explicit.  That might help.

Perhaps more importantly, the banks/credit card companies are just starting to go down the same road.  Any usual purchases and they will send a confirmation to your mobile.  I can see the bad guys phoning/texting you at the same time and trying getting you to press the accept etc.

Never a good idea to respond to anything like this unless you were expecting it and are absolutely sure what it is.

[VeteranISPUser]

BT Openreach, perhaps some more publicity that BT Openreach no longer exists. As soon as the scammers mention that name you know it is scam.

[morrissel311]

Wow this thread was so informative 🙂

[imjolly]

At long last OFCOM taking action and telling providers they must improve their scam/spoof calls protection

https://www.ispreview.co.uk/index.php/2021/10/ofcom-tell-uk-phone-operators-to-block-foreign-voip-sc...

[pauloh_26]

Hi, 

I've also recently been getting calls from an 01568 which seemed a bit suspicious and I saw on this board that it's possibly a spam call spoofing as BT Openreach. Checking out the number it seems to be coming from the Leominster area and I've now blocked it thanks to this board. Cheers for the useful information!

[DeltaOskarMike]

Hi Everyone

Here's a new one which I've not had before..

Asian lady calling me from 'The Post Code Lottery' informing me that I've won £3000+ in a random draw, together with discount vouchers, a holiday and a few other gifts / things..

I asked why me? how did they get my details? she said that the Post Code Lottery would pick random people and give them gift as they were helping the community etc..so they said..

She asked me to confirm my name and confirm age bracket and then asked they would be debiting my bank account with 0.01p to validate that I'm the correct prize recipient and that she needed some sort of direct debit code (off a direct debit mandate) for my bank account..

I'd already sussed out it was a scam as I'd never done the post code lottery.. so I just said no.. im not giving any information like that and told her I think you're running a scam.. and the only cash that would be changing hands would have been mine out of my account into theirs.. if I proceeded any further..

So I just said no thanks..and that calls out of the blue that are too good to be true are just that (scams) and said  dont call me again.. and put the phone down..

As I didn't go any further I cant say what they could have done.. but assuming that this direct debit code and probably other information, would have allowed them just to out in a bogus charge to my bank account and scam me..

I'd be interested to know if anyone else had similar scam calls of this nature..

Update: googled it and found the following - which is exacly what was tried out on me by the scammers.

https://www.onlinethreatalerts.com/article/2021/6/29/postcode-lottery-voucher-scam/

[DeltaOskarMike]

Another call this morning from someone (busy asian call center background sounds) reporting to be from Virgin Media and saying my Virgin router has a security flaw, and giving slow bandwidth. They wanted to access the router and fix the problem, number on phone showed my local std code (which was probably spoofed).

Regards
D.

[grockle]

I report all scams calls on a daily basis using https://www.bt.com/consumer/edw/scams/ 

Since more than a year now. Yesterday was the last time it worked, today there is a formatting problem with the website, as a Web Designer I can see there is a problem, and although I can still enter most data there is an error on the day entry section, the pulldown to choose the day doesn't work. 
Could someone please report this to BT to get it fixed.
I reported it on the feedback on the website but it is weekend.