A Bank of America customer now reports stolen money from a scam where the fraudsters used pressure tactics to trick her.
Barbara, a senior citizen from Orange County, Florida, revealed how she lost her savings in a Bank of America bitcoin scam.
Fraudsters claiming to be Bank of America contacted Barbara with the first call going to her home phone, reports The-Sun.
The call came up as Bank of America (407)-857-7035, which is the number for her local Bank of America finance center, according to the bank’s website.
“She’s telling me how much money they’re trying to get out of the account to the penny,” Barbara explained to news outlet WKMG6.
Following this call, another scammer told her to withdraw cash from her bank account and move it to various Bitcoin accounts.
He emailed her QR codes with the Bank of America logo so she could transfer the money through two cryptocurrency ATMs.
She had no experience in it but was directed to the nearby ATMs.
“‘There’s a place on Colonial Drive,’ he’s directing me now (Colonial Liquor),” she recollected.
Barbara lost $21,000 as a result of the transactions but told the news outlet that despite her lack of experience with bitcoin she was convinced it was the only way to save her money.
The scammers even claimed that the people trying to hack into her account worked at the bank.
“It’s embarrassing and it’s hurtful that it happened but I know other people want to hear my story. It will help someone else,” Barbara tearfully told the interviewer.
Special agent Caroline O’Brien-Buster in charge of investigating such scams told the news outlet: “We just want to bring awareness out to the community.”
“There’s just so many people being victimized by fraudsters and being told to use Bitcoin ATMs.”
O’Brien-Buster noted that these scams can instill a sense of urgency in the victim, pressurizing them to take action.
“They scare you and they say ‘hey, this is the only way that your money is going to be safe,'” she explained.
Also Read: A US Bank is Now Denying Customers Access to Money
Other Banking News Today
Wells Fargo now warns of massive layoffs for 2024 as the banking giant announces a whopping $1bn severance hit.
So far, Wells Fargo, which has its corporate headquarters in California, has fired approximately 11,300 employees in 2023.
This is equal to nearly 5% of its nearly 230,000 workforce, reports CNBC.
As layoffs continue into 2024, Wells Fargo CEO Charlie Scharf has warned investors the costs could amount to a staggering $1 billion.
However, Scharf did not confirm the number of employees that would be affected by the next round of layoffs.
“We’re looking at something like $750 million to a little less than a billion dollars of severance in the fourth quarter that we weren’t anticipating, just because we want to continue to focus on efficiency,” Scharf told investors during a Goldman Sachs conference in New York.
“Wells Fargo needs to get “more aggressive” managing headcount because employee attrition has slowed this year,” Scharf added.
That expense is an accrual for worker layoffs that Wells Fargo expects to make next year, according to a bank spokeswoman.
The company declined to say how many jobs it will cut, says CNBC.
Wall Street leaders including Scharf and Morgan Stanley CEO James Gorman have said that unusually low attrition among their workers has left them bloated.
The industry has been cutting jobs in the past year as it deals with rising funding costs, a prolonged slump in Wall Street deals and concern over loan losses.
Wells Fargo, the fourth-biggest U.S. bank by assets, was already among the most active in laying off workers this year, thanks in part to its “retrenchment” from the mortgage arena.
The bank has cut about 11,300 jobs so far in 2023, or 4.7% of its workforce, and had 227,363 employees as of September, reports CNBC.
Also Read: A Massive Bank Now Closes Several Branches in Florida
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