Softly spoken scammer with English accent nearly steals $4,500 using fake 'NAB Protect' site

A Melbourne-area woman narrowly avoided losing $4,500 after a fraudster posing as a National Australia Bank (NAB) fraud officer persuaded her to download software that shared her screen and allowed the scammer to initiate a transfer, according to a TikTok user who described the episode this week.

The scammer used a soft voice and an English accent and spent about 20 minutes building rapport without asking for passwords, the TikTok user, Tahneea Hoffman, said. The woman was asked to download what appeared to be a NAB subsite called "NAB Protect," which instead provided remote access to her computer and captured her login activity on a cloned bank site.

After the victim logged into the fake site the scammer said he needed to "kick everyone out of your account" and re-verify her phone, a claim meant to conceal a simultaneous transfer that required a phone verification code. The woman later received an automated message from NAB warning of suspicious activity on her account; the caller explained the notice away as routine. The scammer then attempted to move $4,500 and put the woman on hold, pretending to cancel the transfer.

A genuine NAB fraud team member rang the woman while the scammer still had her on the line. Believing the bank caller to be another imposter, she hung up and later went into a branch, where staff confirmed the earlier call was legitimate and intervened to stop the transfer. Bank staff advised that the woman's internet banking was disabled and her computer had to be wiped to remove the remote-access program, Hoffman said.

NAB said the fraudster had "done an impressive job of mimicking the script" used by its staff. NAB Executive Group Investigations member Chris Sheehan said Australia faces a "scam epidemic" and outlined recent measures the bank has taken to reduce impersonation scams, including working with telecommunications companies to prevent call spoofing and removing links from text messages. He said those actions led to an 89% reduction in customer losses from spoofing scams impersonating NAB in 2024.

NAB warned that it will never ask customers to download software or to transfer money to a so-called "safe account," and urged customers who doubt the legitimacy of a call to hang up and call the bank using the number on NAB’s official website. A woman identifying herself as a NAB fraud worker wrote in response to the TikTok post that customers should hang up and re-dial the bank if they are unsure, adding that it makes her job easier.

Security experts said this case highlights an evolution in social engineering tactics: fraudsters are combining convincing phone scripts with cloned websites and remote-access tools to bypass customers' instinct to hang up. The scam described relied on silence and repetition of official-sounding phrases, a phone-recording prompt, and incremental requests that avoided asking the victim for passwords while capturing credentials through a cloned portal.

Authorities and banks continue to advise that customers never download unsolicited software, never provide verification codes to callers, and verify unexpected bank messages or calls by independently contacting their financial institution. NAB's public guidance reiterates that customers should treat any request to install software or transfer funds offline as a likely scam and to confirm legitimacy through the bank's published contact channels.

The incident underscores ongoing challenges for financial institutions as fraudsters refine techniques that exploit legitimate remote-access tools, caller ID spoofing and cloned web pages. NAB said it will continue to work with industry and telecommunications partners to reduce impersonation scams and to educate customers on how to recognise and respond to attempts to gain remote control of devices or authorise transfers.