If, unfortunately, you have been the victim of a scam and your money has been stolen, you need to know how to proceed correctly. Scams, deceptions, frauds… They are everywhere and we must always be alert to cases of phishing, impersonation of companies by telephone call, SMS, among others. Cybercriminals continue to refine their techniques to make them more believable and almost no one is safe from being deceived.
If, unfortunately, you have been the victim of a scam and your money has been stolen, you need to know how to proceed correctly, not only to try to recover it, but also to protect your data.
To do this, we are going to explain how to do it based on the 4 fundamental steps that the renowned criminologist specializing in cybersecurity, María Aperador Montoya, explains in her blog post.
The 4 steps you should take if you have been scammed
The first thing is (1) to gather as much information as possible about what has happened to you: things like screenshots of conversations, emails, messages, URLs of sites, payment receipts or bank account movements, as well as any other documents that may be relevant.
In other words, you must collect evidence and even search the Internet to make sure that no one is committing crimes in your name. Once you have everything you can provide, (2) take all the documentation to the police and report the crime so that an investigation can be opened. That said, as soon as you realize that you have been scammed, you should (3)contact your bank as soon as possible.
The best thing to do is to cancel any possible transactions that may have been made so that your accounts can be blocked. But note that it is better not to cancel the accounts, as reactivating them could involve additional costs and other complications. It is also advisable to renew your passwords for any online accounts you have active and increase security with double authentication
In the event that you are asked to install a computer program, uninstall it and run the antivirus as soon as possible, in addition to (4) reporting the incident to the company they supposedly represented (app, online store or payment platform). This is necessary because some of these platforms have procedures for this type of case and could help you get your money back.
