It was a Saturday morning, a day after the new year and Joseph Mburu was relaxing in his house.
At around 8 am, he got a call from someone who claimed he was a Safaricom Customer care staff.
Mburu who hails from Eastlands told the Star that the caller, a male staff notified him that his line had had double registration and they were trying to sort out the issue.
"Aliniambia eti line yangu imeregistiwa mara mbili, kwa njina langu na mtu anaitwa Esther Njeri. So akasema ndio laini yangu isifungwe, anahitaji kuniuliza masawali kadhaa," Mburu said.
(He told me that my line had been registered twice on my name and a user called Esther Njeri. So for my line not to be locked, he said he would ask me some questions to verify the line really belongs to me).
Mburu said the caller asked him to state the last amount of top-up he had done and the last two numbers he had dialled which he did.
He was then directed to M-Pesa details and without knowing, he revealed his details thinking the caller was a Safaricom staff.
Some minutes later, he got a notification that his Sh15,000 had been withdrawn.
"I was shocked and in fact, I thought I was dreaming. It later hit me that I had been duped. I tried to reach out to Safaricom for help but it was too late," he said.
Grace Lumbasi, a wife and a mother to teenage girls told the Star that through similar tricks, her entire saving was withdrawn.
She said on Sunday, January 3 she was relaxing in her room because she was feeling unwell.
"I was sleeping after I took medication until my last born daughter woke me that I had a call. When I answered, the caller, a man told me that my M-Pesa had been blocked because my line had some complications," Lumbasi said.
According to her, the caller notified her that she would not be able to do any M-Pesa transactions unless the issue is sorted out.
"Since I was feeling unwell, I did not even think through, Immediately asked him how they could help since I was convinced that he was a Safaricom Staff. He asked me some lead questions which I responded to" she said.
A few minutes later, she was shocked to get a notification that her M-Pesa balance was zero.
"I have never been duped like this, I almost fainted. I had sacrificed a lot despite the coronavirus pandemic to save something to help me in this year, then just in minutes someone walks away with it," she said.
She said she had saved some Sh55,000 and she intended to use part of the money to pay school fees for her kids while the remaining to buy a cow.
"I have always wanted to own a cow and I knew my dream was coming true, now I don't know where to start," she said.
Mburu and Lumbasi are among many other Kenyans who have fallen victims to such tricks costing them fortunes.
The Star has established that the conmen have devised ways in which they lure unsuspecting targets.
Fraudsters are always devising new ways to con people.
Since it is hard for scammers to infiltrate the M-Pesa system, they opt for non-technical methods, or social engineering, as it is popularly known.
This involves tricking unsuspecting people into breaking normal security procedures and finally manipulating them into among other things, revealing M-Pesa PIN or withdrawing from ATMs remotely.
"What is shocking is how the conmen get to know someone's both names, the last amount they toped-up, and M-Pesa details," Mburu said.
To him, even if is it is the work of conmen, insiders within Safaricom must have a hand by providing key information to the conmen.
A story ran by BBC news in 2018 also reveals how several users had fallen victims to such tricks.
One of the users said that when the conman called, he was confused, he had not asked for a new card - and just moments earlier he had terminated a call that he now realised must have been from a fraudster who had posed as a customer services adviser from the phone company.
As he sought to inquire from Safaricom, he completely lost access to his number and only got back control after three days.
I was completely baffled and scared.
— Baba Jimmy (@sammy_wyna) July 16, 2018
I know that a SIM swap cannot be done without:
- Myself being present at a Safaricom shop or an authorized agent,
- Without my ID card,
- Without my PIN,
- Without knowledge of my transactions details e.g last numbers called, last top up etc
Despite the fact that the user had not given out any details, he lost all the money on his M-Pesa account.
But the telecommunication company told the Star that it has been running a campaign on fraud advising customers that it only calls from the 0722000000 line.
A senior officer who sought anonymity said the company has also been advising customers to not give out information to fraudsters.
He said anti-fraud campaigns are running on all platforms including television, radio stations and all vernacular stations.
"The basis of a media story should begin with facts not 'is it true', otherwise there are very many claims that are unsubstantiated and fly every day," he said.
To him, users should just be cautious as fraudsters call numbers at random.
Safaricom remains the biggest telecommunications provider in the country and one of the most profitable companies in the region.
It controls approximately 63.5 per cent of the Kenyan market and as at 30 June 2019, it had a subscriber base estimated at 33.1 million.
In terms of the voice market and SMS market share, Safaricom controls 56.8 per cent and 95.5 per cent respectively.
Safaricom was formed in 1997 as a fully owned subsidiary of Telkom Kenya.
