A woman from County Tyrone lost £17,000 from her bank account after scammers contacted her pretending to represent Revolut. Rhonda Montgomery discovered the theft when she could not pay for a cup of coffee at home. She checked her app and found over £8,000 taken in payments overnight.

The scam started during her business trip to Germany. Callers claimed to report suspicious payments and provided her account details. She believed they worked for the bank. A week later, further scammers called while she waited in Revolut's online chat. They convinced her to transfer funds to a new temporary account, which they set up on screen. She noted the name and address linked to that account.

Montgomery flew to Cambridge in England to the address. She knocked on the door but the man whose name appeared on the account was not present. His mother stated he no longer lived there and was estranged from the family.

She recovered about £4,000 from fraudulent card payments. After media contact with Revolut, the bank refunded £9,000 sent directly to the scammers. Revolut stated fraudsters use social engineering to impersonate institutions and gain account access.

Chris Wynne, fraud and scam prevention manager at Danske Bank, explained scammers gather personal data from data breaches available on the dark web. They pose as fraud team members to obtain more information.