Man loses $6,000 after debit card gets linked to scammers' digital wallet

He had transferred $10,000 into a secondary bank account for an upcoming overseas trip, but ended up losing $6,000 after his card was fraudulently added to a digital wallet.

A man surnamed Li, 50, told Shin Min Daily News he had received an SMS from the bank regarding four charges to his debit card on Oct 30.

Upon checking his account, the property agent discovered four transactions made in Taiwan totalling $5,988. He immediately contacted the bank's customer service and requested to block his debit card.

He subsequently received an email from the bank stating that they could only process his dispute request once the transactions were posted, and that they would monitor his account for the next 10 days.

After the transactions were posted on Nov 2, Li called the bank again and was reportedly told they would follow up on the case.

However, he was informed on Nov 14 that the bank's investigations indicated he had authorised the transactions.

Pointing at the SMSes he received on Oct 25 about his card being added to Apple Pay, and the OTP to confirm the addition, Li said he did not see these two text messages, and only knew about it after bank staff informed him.

"I don't use an iPhone, and did not share the OTP with anyone," he added.

"Even if I gave the OTP for scammers to add my card to the e-wallet, those four transactions were not made by me, so how can they say that I authorised it?"

The man subsequently lodged a police report. The police confirmed to Shin Min that they had received the report.

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lim.kewei@asiaone.com