Listen: Edenderry Woman Details Being Scammed By Person Claiming To Be From An Post

The man rang from a number that matched An Post's number, resulting in a much more believable scam

A woman from Edenderry has detailed her experience of being victim to a scam claiming to be An Post.

On this morning's Kildare Today programme, Kathleen explained her ordeal on a phone call claiming to be from An Post over the weekend.

On Saturday morning, as Kathleen was taking part in a first aid course with Midlands Training, she received a call from an 01 number.

When answered, a man with a Dublin accent spoke to Kathleen, claiming he was from An Post and stated immediately that he would not be asking her any details of her account, due to recent An Post frauds.

He then asked if Kathleen had made any transactions from her account in the past 24 hours to Amazon, as he claimed there was £148 being looked for from her account.

He also said €36 was being looked for by Apple.

The man then went on to explain An Post had "received a text of some sort", which they were able to block, and said he can send it to Kathleen to confirm.

When sent the text, Kathleen noted it contained the last four digits of her bank card.

She assumed this call from the man claiming to be from An Post was genuine, as she had not previously given any information about her bank card.

Kathleen was asked to confirm a six-digit number that was also in the text.

However, Kathleen expressed she was uncomfortable with this, to which the man simply stated that An Post only had one number, and she could look it up.

Kathleen said both the An Post number that showed up online and the number the man was calling her from were the same.

Therefore, Kathleen believed it was genuine.

She was told her card would be blocked, and delete the An Post app off her phone, to which she did.

Kathleen then went on to say that she went on with her day, and it was not until that evening when she was telling this to her husband that she thought of redownloading the app.

When redownloading and opening the An Post app, Kathleen said that is when she discovered the money from her account was gone.

She contacted An Post, who confirmed it was more than likely that the call she received from that man was a scam.

She was told she would receive a call the following Monday from An Post regarding her situation.

However, after not hearing from them early Monday, Kathleen rang An Post herself, to which she claims An Post were not aware of her situation.

Speaking to an An Post member, Kathleen was told there is an app that is available to download for €20, where you can replicate a phone number and have it appear as your own.

In Kathleen's case, it is likely the man who scammed her had replicated the An Post phone number onto his phone, leading to his call presenting as a call from An Post.

Mary D'Arcy, Financial and Crime Lead at FraudSmart, said they have seen fraudsters being able to impersonate numbers, and these scam text messages fall under the thread of genuine text messages.

You can listen back to the full interview with Kathleen and Mary D'Arcy here: