SALOME
(Not her real name) was woken up by an incoming call in the wee hours
of Tuesday morning, the caller identified herself as Patricia of
Safaricom Care Centre.
Patricia
told her that her name was randomly sampled to be among the customers
to answer a series of questions on their satisfaction with Safaricom’s
value added services.
The
caller had polished English and was very polite typical of Safaricom
customer care agents. Meanwhile, the caller took her through several
advises when using Safaricom services, particularly on the need to keep
secret all your Mpesa pin.
When the conversation got deeper, the caller requested for Salome’s SIM CARD PIN to assist her(the caller) demonstrate a point.
Note
that the caller did not ask for MPESA pin and so it appeared completely
safe. The moment she finished giving the 4 digit SIM card PIN, the
caller disconnected the call immediately.
It
was a few minutes past 6.00am and she could no longer use her phone.
She then realized there was no Safaricom network on her phone and
thought her phone was faulty. She couldn’t do much as no shops were open
at that time.
At
8.20am after taking breakfast she went to a mobile phone repair shop
just outside her house. She gave out her phone for repair, only for the
technician to realize the phone was ok as it was working with other SIM
cards. She was advised to replace her SIM card and did exactly that.
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The
replaced SIM card was now working but she had to activate her MPESA
afresh so that she could pay for the replacement service. To her dismay,
a whole Ksh 70,000.00 was missing from her MPESA. The balance as per
the previous night was Ksh. 73,578.00.
The
new balance was slightly over Ksh3000.00. YES, she gave the wrong
information to a clever CRIMINAL. NB; THE CRIMINAL DID NOT NEED TO GET
MPESA PIN TO STEAL THE MONEY THIS IS HOW THE CRIMINAL TRANSFERRED THE
KSH. 70,000.00; Patricia (the criminal) was savvy enough to know that
Salome wouldn’t have much problem giving her SIM PIN as the sim pin is
NEVER used for MPESA.
The
criminal had bought a new inactivated sim to use for a SIM SWAP. As she
communicated to Salome with one phone, the other hand held a handset
with the inactivated sim, ready to do a SIM SWAP. Immediately Salome
disclosed her sim pin, the criminal did a sim swap; remember a sim swap
only requires you enter the pin you originally used before losing the
previous sim. The deal was done.
She
then activated MPESA using the same PIN as the START KEY and then
proceeded to do the worst; Transferring a cool 70,000.00 from Salome’s
line. All this time, Salome was waiting for shops to open to take her
phone for “repair”.
That’s how MPESA CRIMINALS OPERATE. BE WARNED!
©Kasanews
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