How fraudsters use Tinubu, Atiku ‘funds’ to hack bank accounts of unsuspecting Nigerians

As the presidential election approaches, fraudsters have devised a scheme by which they hope to defraud gullible Nigerians seeking to profit financially from candidates of various political parties in the name of vote buying. They have hatched a plot in which they seemingly gain access into the bank accounts of victims and empty such accounts.

They send out SMS text or WhatsApp message to their victims, informing them that they have been picked to receive a certain amount of money from the presidential candidate, and ask the receiver to send bank account details to receive the fund which amount varies, depending on the scammer or candidate being used.

Some Nigerians received the messages, purportedly from either the People’s Democratic Party (PDP) or the All Progressive Congress (APC) asking them to claim the money tagged “campaign fund” from their respective presidential candidate.

The message promising ‘Tinubu fund’ reads: “Are you voting Claim your 10,000 Naira Bola Ahmed Tinubu Presidential Campaign Funds. *APPLY NOW*Click to view site”.

The ‘Atiku fund’ message reads: “Congratulations!!! You have been approved for the sum of 70,000 naira from (Atiku Abubakar) (PDP) call Mr Emmanuel (08088234852) for Payment or send your account number”

The Atiku message was sent via WhatsApp with sender number +234 906 462 6759 with a name appearing as Mr Johnson.

Another SMS message from the ‘Atiku fund’ sent via +234 903 897 7212 reads: “WELL DONE!!! YOU HAVE JUST BEEN GIFTED A TOKEN OF (N95,000) THOUSAND NAIRA FROM ATIKU ABUBAKAR EMPOWERMENT FUNDS CALL MR HAMZA TO BE CREDITED Now (09069557401).

When Ripples Nigeria correspondent called Mr Hamza his line could not be reached.

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He went ahead to then call Mr Emmanuel who asked for an account number to credit. Our correspondent proceeded to send him a First Bank account number but he replied “Sterling or Keystone Bank sir”, but our corrspondent replied that he had neither of those.

Mr Emmanuel called our correspondent and asked if he could get a trusted relative or friend with a bank account in either of the two banks listed to help him receive the funds. And our correspondent told him he could get one. Mr Emmanuel encouraged him to get it so he does not miss out on the money.

Our correspondent then sent him the Keystone Bank account of a friend, and within minutes he called back to inform our correspondent that a code had been sent to the phone number of the friend, and that he should retrieve the code and send to him to claim the cash. How he got the phone number registered to the bank account of the friend remains a mystery.

For the ‘Tinubu fund’, our correspondent clicked on the link which takes one to a page requesting personal details such as name, address, and phone number. After submitting these details, one is asked to submit account details. After filling in an account number, the next page conveys a congratulatory message.

A search of the phone numbers on TrueCaller did not reveal the identities of the fraudsters, as they only came up with first names.

Efforts to reach Sterling Bank and Keystone Bank to explain how the fraudsters are able to penetrate their cyber security systems to get a customer’s phone number registered on the accounts, and send out a code proved abortive as they did not reply to enquiries.

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