Monzo launches new tool to protect customers from impersonation scams

Digital bank Monzo has gone live with a new tool to help customers avoid falling victim to impersonation scams.

The new, first-of-its-kind tool sits inside the app and aims to provide customers with an “additional layer of comfort and security” by verifying whether a call ‘from Monzo’ really is from Monzo.

Impersonation scams can often take the form of very sophisticated fraud attempts where criminals try to convince individuals that they are from an organisation, such as a bank, to get information or even payments from somebody.

Monzo’s solution? A running ‘call status’ that shows whether someone from the Monzo team is talking to you.

So any time a customer gets a call from a person claiming to be Monzo — something the bank says it doesn’t do without arranging it in advance in the app and carrying out security checks — they can go to the privacy and security section of the Monzo app and check whether someone from the team has called them.

“Impersonation scams are an industry-wide problem and becoming increasingly sophisticated with tens of thousands of people each year convinced to transfer funds out of their accounts and into the hands of fraudsters,” Monzo senior staff engineer Priyesh Patel said.

“With world-class tech at the forefront of everything we do here at Monzo, we continue to invest and innovate to stop fraud from happening, and crucially, before customers are impacted.” 

The launch of the new feature follows research from UK Finance that more than £170m was lost to impersonation scams last year, with only 51 per cent of people checking whether a request for money or personal information is legitimate.

“Monzo’s call status tool is a hugely welcome innovation that will help keep people safe against fraud,” Stop Scams UK CEO Mark Tierney said.

“Enabling consumers to be able to verify that they are talking to a trusted authority is key to beating the scammers.