Read Online The Crocodile Nest by Des Hunt - Free Book Online

automatically logged you on to the real site.’
    ‘But what about TXTbak?’ asked Lora. ‘Gran should’ve got a security code sent to her phone.’
    Luke switched back to the bank site and accessed the contact details. ‘Is that your phone number?’
    ‘The landline is,’ replied Beth, ‘but I’m not sure if that’s my mobile number.’
    Lora whipped out a phone and furiously pushed buttons. ‘No! It’s not Gran’s.’
    ‘So they could take more of my money!’ cried Beth. ‘They can take money whenever they want.’
    Luke nodded. ‘We need to ring the bank.’
    It took most of the day to sort things out, and by then they all knew a lot more about Internet banking scams.
    Beth had been the target of a phishing attack: the email was the hook, and the spoof web page was the line that reeled her in. The thing that worried the bank was that there were features to the attack that they’d not come across before. The fact that the thief had managed to change the mobile phone number used for TXTbak security was particularly alarming. The bank was moving quickly to ensure that it couldn’t happen again.
    Of more concern to Luke was that the attack had been aimed directly at Beth. The account number in the email was the correct one. This was no ordinary phishing attack where an email was spammed to millions of people. This was spear-phishing, where the email was created just for Beth. His firstthought was that it might have something to do with the sale of the cardigan. But Brian at the bank thought differently. He suggested that a trojan virus had got installed on the computer. This would then search for banking details and send them to the thief. Brian suggested running a virus-checker over the computer.
    That’s when Luke began to get angry: the virus-checker had been turned off.
    He turned to Lora, who was lying on the sofa listening to music. ‘Did you turn off the virus-checker?’
    ‘Had to,’ she answered without looking at him. ‘The P2P program wouldn’t install unless I did.’
    ‘So you turned off the firewall and the virus-checker?’
    Now she looked up. ‘Yeah! What’s your problem?’
    ‘My problem, and yours, is that a trojan virus came in with that P2P program. That’s how the scammers got Beth’s details.’
    Lora got up from the sofa. ‘Prove it!’ she demanded.
    ‘I will!’ replied Luke, just as aggressively. Now it was time to get his own back—he hoped.
    The virus-checker seemed to take forever. File after file was searched without any hint of a virus. Luke could sense Lora beginning to gloat beside him. Then it found one: a trojan by the name of Ratspyz.
    ‘There!’ he shouted, stabbing the screen. ‘There’s your proof!’
    ‘That doesn’t prove it came in with the P2P.’
    ‘How else could it have got there? The firewall and virus-checkers have been on all the rest of the time. The only program installed since you turned them off is your P2P.’
    That silenced her. She sat there stiffly, as Luke went about removing the virus and restoring all the security settings. Even when he removed the P2P program, she said nothing. Luke realized she might never be able to say sorry, but he was happy enough to accept her silence as an admission of guilt. From now on, maybe she’d think twice before she accused him again.

Chapter 11
    More was revealed about the scam on Monday. The bank, with the help of the police, uncovered most of the facts in the case.
    Twenty thousand dollars was the maximum that could be transferred to another account under the TXTbak security system. It had gone to an account that had been opened three weeks before. Although the owner’s name was not released by the bank, they did say that he had provided a Romanian passport as ID, and a power bill as proof of address. Police called him the mule: he was the middleman who shipped the money on to the scammer. It now seemed that the power bill had been forged, and the passport was a fake, too. Neither would