There has been a significant increase in SIM swap fraud, and ABSA has been named as the bank of many of the victims who have lost money through this scam.
In one of the latest reported cases an ABSA customer lost R159,000.
According to this ABSA customer, a large portion of this money was withdrawn, and ABSA said it will not refund this money.
She added that, despite having insurance against fraud on her account, ABSA said that the nature of the SIM swap fraud means that the insurance does not cover her.
ABSA was asked about the scourge of SIM swap fraud, and the company provided the following insight.
Can you please comment on the prevalence of SIM swap fraud related to ABSA?
Banking fraud is a major concern to ABSA. Significant investment is made in helping to ensure our customers are aware of safe banking practices. Fraud by means of a criminal performing a SIM swap on a customer’s number cannot happen in isolation. The customer will have had to divulge their personal banking details, PIN and password – even unknowingly – by means of clicking on a phishing email or SMS. It should be noted that this is an industry-wide problem.
What should consumers do if they fall prey to SIM swap fraud?
Be vigilant and always be aware of your mobile phone’s network connectivity status. If you realise that you are not receiving any calls or SMS notifications, contact your mobile network operator to ensure that a SIM swap has not been performed.
What advice can you give consumers to avoid SIM swap fraud?
- Do not click on any links contained within an email or SMS that appears to have been sent by a financial institution.
- If in doubt about the validity of a communication from your bank, contact their security centre or helpline.
- Never click on a link contained in an email or SMS.
- Subscribe to the notification service that alerts you when there is activity on your bank account.
- Some Mobile Network Operators send its customers an SMS to alert them of an instruction to SIM swop and customers should contact their Mobile Network Operators if the request is was not specifically completed by them.
- Make a habit of checking your bank statements and online banking transaction history regularly. In this way, you will able to timeously identify any unauthorised transactions.
- Change your internet banking password regularly.
What measures are you implementing to combat SIM swap fraud?
ABSA provides its clients with a free copy of industry-leading internet security and anti-virus software for both computers and mobile phones. This software will mitigate the risk of customers visiting illegitimate ‘banking’ websites that have been setup so gain a customer’s account details, PIN and passwords. Absa is also aware of a practice whereby service providers are loading fraudulent and unauthorised debit order instructions for payments of up to R99.99. Absa customers have had limited exposure to this type of fraud and other banking fraud due to our NotifyMe service that allows customers to receive SMS notifications on transaction values from as little as R10.
Has ABSA refunded any SIM swap fraud victims? If no, why not?
Where fraudulent transactions on accounts have been stopped and funds recovered, ABSA does reimburse customers. It is the customer’s responsibility to keep their personal account details safe together with their PIN and password. If an account is accessed using these legitimate details, the bank can unfortunately not be held liable for the loss.
Can you conclusively say that there is no weakness within ABSA (employee or otherwise) which has been providing access to Internet banking accounts to fraudsters (through any means)?
No answer from ABSA
Is there any way in which ABSA banking customers can safeguard against large amounts of money being transferred out of their accounts by fraudsters in SIM swap scams?
No answer from ABSA
More on SIM swap fraud in South Africa
How scammers hack your bank account
R159,000 stolen in MTN SIM swap scam