A foreign national, who masquerades as Pastor Phillips from India, has allegedly scammed several elderly people of an undisclosed amount of money. It is alleged the "pastor" sent links to prayer services on WhatsApp, and hacked into their banking apps.
Prem Balram, the head of Reaction Unit South Africa, said his team received information from several people on Sunday regarding the alleged scam.
“The people knew each other and all of them said they received calls from the same number requesting that the person answering the call, click on a link and provide a six digit code. The victims were led to believe the code would allow them access to a prayer service via video call.
"Other victims received calls from different numbers with a +91 prefix, which is the country code for India. It is believed the codes were used to scam the victims of cash via their banking apps. This could not be confirmed and the number of victims or value taken could not be verified."
One of the people, who were contacted, recorded her conversation with the "pastor".
“A recorded conversation was shared with Rusa by a victim. One of the numbers that has been traced, showed ownership in the state of Andhra Pradesh in the southeast region of India. The scammer is, however, believed to be from Africa, but this is unconfirmed,” Balram added.
In a voice recording of a conversation with an elderly woman and the pastor, the pastor can be heard telling the woman the prayer service call was on a WhatsApp group called DPC Senior Citizens. He said he would have the prayer group meeting at 8.30pm.
The woman told the pastor she would join if she was available but he kept asking her to join and open the link, while they were on the phone. She said she did not look at her phone as she was busy. The pastor insisted she check her phone to see if she received the link.
Balram said he shared the information on social media, so elderly people, who have been the target of scammers, could be made aware.