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Hundreds of thousands of dollars have allegedly been swiped from unsuspecting Western Australians.
Detectives say four men stole personal details using phishing scams before going on a mass spending spree.
Police recently released footage of the wanted 22-year-old Singara man being hauled off a Sydney flight in handcuffs and under tight police guard at Perth Airport on September 20.
He’s one of four people accused of running a Western Australia-based SMS phishing scam targeting vulnerable Australians.
Phishing scams are when scammers pose as trustworthy companies or websites and trick people into sharing sensitive information, often using a link supplied by the scammers.
“It’s a very, very low cost way of potentially generating hundreds of thousands of dollars of revenue,” cybersecurity expert Paul Haskell-Dowland told 9News.
Police allege the syndicate posed as banks to trick victims into sharing personal details.
The four men, from Sinagra to Morley, are facing more than 70 charges, including fraud and theft.
Detectives say the group spent more than $300,000 across a two-week period – between July 28 and August 10 last year – using stolen bank details via Apple Pay at Perth retailers.
That triggered an Australian Federal Police investigation in September last year.
Police arrested all four suspects during state-wide raids between July and October this year.
They include the 22-year-old Singara man, 24-year-old Kallaroo man Sam Joseph Wareing, a 19-year-old Banksia Grove man, and a 31-year-old Morley man.
Wareing was due to appear at Fremantle Magistrates Court today, but failed to show.
His lawyer stated he was unwell and will enter not guilty pleas at Perth Magistrates Court later this month.
There were 109,000 reports of text scams last year, which is up 37 per cent, while phone call scammers drained $116 million, with those aged over 65 hit hardest.
“Recognising scams used to be relatively simple,” Haskell-Dowland said.
“You could look for the dodgy looking emails, you could look for the SMSs, often written in capital letters with bad spelling.”
The advice is to be aware and never share.
