PriyaPatelThis article reports on a recent incident in which scammers drained $20,000 from a customer’s JPMorgan Chase account. The customer, Kathryn England, received a phone call from someone claiming to be from the bank’s fraud department and informing her that money had been wired out of her account. The scammer instructed England to follow his instructions in order to recover the funds. England complied, providing verification codes sent via text message and eventually deleting the Chase app from her device. However, she never received the promised call back and later discovered that she had been duped, with the scammer successfully wiring out the money.
The report highlights that JPMorgan Chase denied England’s claim for reimbursement, citing a loophole in the Electronic Fund Transfer Act. The law typically protects individuals from unauthorized transactions, such as hacking or stolen cards, but it does not cover situations where individuals are tricked by scammers into authorizing transactions. This lack of protection has become more prevalent during the COVID-19 pandemic, as wire transfers are now easily accessible through digital banking, rather than requiring an in-person visit to a bank branch.
