The Charity Commission has today warned the public against donating to “sham” animal welfare and migrant appeals run by “criminal groups”, after a report from The National Fraud Investigation Bureau.
In a warning sent out today, the Charity Commission said that the NFIB has identified two charitable scams aimed at defrauding the British public into giving money, which in some cases “is being laundered from the UK to overseas and diverted to support criminal activity”.
The first fraud is based on what the regulator called a “fake animal welfare charity overseas”, whereby criminal groups are “using social media platforms to target donors from the UK”.
The NFIB also identified a fake ‘Migrant Helpline’, which has been sending out a “high number of phishing emails to personal and business email addresses purporting to be from ‘Migrant Helpine’, and warned that charitable email addresses could also be targeted.
The Charity Commission said that Migrant Helpline is a genuine charity, but that the fraudsters have been using its name “to trick members of the public into becoming victims of this fraud”, and that the fraud is “in no way related to the real charity”.
The main email address sending the majority of these fraudulent emails has been identified as ‘[email protected]’; however the Commission warned that “multiple email addresses have been seen”.
Both the NFIB and the Commission have said that the first name, last name and telephone numbers appear to be targeted and correct for those who they are sent to. The email has a link which, if clicked, downloads a virus onto the victim’s device which is used to target and steal personal and corporate banking details.
Donors told to be 'vigilant' by Commission
The commission has advised donors to be “vigilant”, and said that genuine charities will “print their registration details on all documentation”. Donors have also been advised to “watch out for poor grammar/spelling in emails” and to “send your donation to the charity directly”.
Carl Mehta, head of investigations and enforcement at the Charity Commission, said: "The British public donate millions of pounds every year to good causes, any attempt to abuse this generosity is reprehensible. Do not be put off donating by these malicious scams, but follow the commission’s advice on safer giving."
Both scams were identified in seperate reports issued by the NFIB at the end of last year.
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