Fraud awareness and online security
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Fraud awareness when sending your funds abroad
Using Global Reach for your currency requirements means you can make quick and efficient international money transfers to your trusted suppliers and contacts.
Unfortunately, criminals are always looking for new ways to defraud companies and individuals. We want to help you ensure your funds are only reaching those you intend to receive them, so before authorising a payment from your Global Reach account, please make sure that you’re not sending funds:
- To someone you don't know
- To prove availability of funds
- To a firm that has recently changed the details of their bank account without verifying the details directly with you
- To a person you met online and who is in need of funds
- To pay for an unexpected tax bill
- For an unsolicited investment opportunity
- As an advanced fee in order to claim a larger sum of money from a previously unknown inheritance, a prize, or compensation.
- To an unregulated investment company
To help keep your money safe and protect your money, please read our guide, which highlights the ways you can protect your funds.
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Useful resources
We would also encourage you to take a look at these resources:
FCA Smart SCAM
The Financial Conduct Authority (FCA) provides information to help you avoid investment and pensions scams: https://www.fca.org.uk/scamsmart.
Action Fraud
Action Fraud is the UK's national reporting centre for fraud and cybercrime where you should report fraud if you have been scammed, defrauded, or experienced cybercrime. It also provides news and alerts on the latest scams: https://www.actionfraud.police.uk/.
Take Five
Take Five offers straightforward advice to help everyone in the UK to protect themselves against financial fraud: https://takefive-stopfraud.org.uk/.
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Contact Us
Email [email protected], or call 020 7989 0000 for personal enquiries, or 020 3465 8200 for corporate fraud concerns, if:
- You’ve authorised a payment which you now believe is part of a scam
- An account had been set up at Global Reach in your name, without your knowledge or authority
- You’ve made a payment to an account held with us, which you think is fraudulent
Read our guide to learn more about protecting your funds, here.
Online security
Fraudsters are becoming ever more sophisticated, here are some tips that we hope will protect you online.
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Fraud by email
Fraudsters may create email domains that are very similar to genuine organisations in an attempt to trick people into thinking that the email is genuine or they may take over someone’s email.
Before clicking on a link, or opening an attachment contained in an email, double check the email address, especially if you were not expecting the email.
Similarly, if you receive an email advising you of a firm’s change of bank details, call the firm using a number you already have, or go directly to their website to verify the new bank details, before updating and using the new details.
If you are unsure if an email is from Global Reach, please contact us on [email protected].
You can also check Global Reach bank details on our website.
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Password security
Use a strong password, with a mixture of upper and lower-case characters and numbers and special symbols. Or consider using a passphrase where possible, this may make it easier to remember for you, but harder to crack.
Global Reach would also suggest that you do not reuse passwords for multiple online accounts, as this makes it easier for hackers to gain access to multiple accounts once one has been compromised.
Never write your passwords down or carry around login information.
Never share your passwords with anyone.
Should you believe that you have accidently given out your Global Reach login details, change your password immediately or you can contact us on [email protected].
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Fraud by phone
Criminals may call pretending to be someone else. Beware of any unsolicited calls from banks or companies. Never give any login or any confidential information over the phone. If you are ever in doubt, call back the company on the official number that you have independently found.
Criminals also use text messages to scam people. Never put your personal information in a text message to someone you don’t know. As with emails never click on links unless you are confident of who the sender is.
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Tips for staying safe online
Top tips for staying safe online
- Consider using a password manager to keep your passwords secure; this also helps when trying to remember lots of passwords.
- Enable Multi-Factor Authentication wherever possible.
- Be cautious and aware of what you are browsing when using a public wi-fi connection, e.g. in a café or train station.
- Keep your anti-virus up to date; there are lots of free tools now which can help you with this.
- If you have children browsing the internet at home, consider using your internet service provider's (ISP) free parental controls to help keep them safe.
- Check any website you are using is secure by checking for the green padlock in the address bar or that the site is https:// rather than http://. However, please don't take this as a guarantee that the site is genuine; scammers can still purchase these security certificates themselves.
- Check a website's URL for any abnormalities or misspellings, e.g. gllobalreachgroup.com or globalreachreachgroup-uk.com would be examples of non-genuine/scam sites. If in doubt, navigate using a search engine like Google to search for the company that you want to reach.
- Keep the software on your computer up to date, particularly your computer operating system and internet browser. These updates are there to protect against vulnerabilities.
- Be cautious of what you share on social media. All major social media sites will have built-in security options; review this to ensure you restrict access to your information to only those you wish to share it with.
- And finally, if it looks too good to be true, e.g. very low prices or amazing offers, then it probably is! Scammers set up fake sites to try and gather information from people.
The Government and Citizens Advice have provided some tips to help you stay secure online and check whether something might be a scam, in the links provided below.