Sydney family conned out of $1 million after falling victim to email scam
A Northern Beaches family is pleading with all Australians to be aware of scams, after coming close to losing their life savings and dream house in a sophisticated dupe.
Cassie and Dennis Aviles handed over $1.1 million to who they believed was their solicitor in order to finalise the sale of their new house.
“It’s basically everything,” Ms Aviles said.
“I’ve gone to the branch and transferred all of our money and who they are now telling us is in some kind of scam account and they’re not sure if they’re going to be able to retrieve it for us,” she said.
The couple, who have three young children, had sold their Beacon Hill property and were due to complete settlement on the new house next week.
Yesterday morning, they received what appeared to be a completely legitimate email from their solicitor instructing them to transfer the large sum of money.
“[The email had] his name, his business name and all of the contracts we’ve signed for the new property were all attached,” a distraught Ms Aviles said.
Ms Aviles alerted her solicitor that she’d paid the money into what she thought was the firm’s Commonwealth Bank account.
“He yelled into the phone call the bank straight away.”
The Aviles’ solicitor, Tanveer Khan, is just as baffled as the couple as to how the scammer has obtained the information.
“I’ve never even heard of anything like that,” Mr Khan, a solicitor at TKF Lawyers, said.
“It’s such a big amount, the bank should have more procedures in place.”
9News has contacted both banks involved, who have been able to retrieve the funds.
The money has been frozen and will be returned to the Aviles family in the coming days.
In a statement to 9News, St George Bank said: “email compromise scams are on the rise, and we encourage our customers to remain vigilant.
“In this case, being notified of the scam early has allowed us to work with another financial institution to investigate the issue quickly and work to return the missing money to our customers.
“If a customer believes they have been the victim of a scam they should call us immediately – the sooner we know about it, the sooner we can attempt to recover the funds.
“We encourage customers transferring money to check the account number with the recipient over the phone before transferring any funds.”
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“If you believe you have made an incorrect payment or paid the wrong recipient, contact your financial institution as soon as possible to report it,” a CBA spokesperson said.
“Your financial institution will always try its best to recover funds, and the best chance of this is when action is taken as soon as possible.”
Mona Vale Police have also been alerted of the scam and are now looking into the case.
