A spokesman for the diocese of York said this week: “The sender has taken some trouble both with identifying their chosen pseudo-sender and the intended victim. In many cases the sender has used an untraceable Gmail address, or texted from an equally untraceable pay-as-you-go or ‘burner’ mobile phone.”
At least one person is believed to have lost £1000 in the con and another only narrowly avoided losing a similar sum when they became suspicious after being asked to supply the voucher codes.
The diocesan spokesman continued: “It seems this is a national trend with similar reports from other Church of England dioceses. We have reported one specimen case to North Yorkshire police who have passed it over to Action Fraud, a national police scheme. Incumbents may like to consider advising their church officers and PCC members that: ‘I will never ask you by email to spend your own money for the church’.”
A joint unit of Northumbria, Cleveland, and Durham police has issued an alert over similar issues in the northeast, saying: “Clergy will never ask you to give them money, vouchers, or personal banking details directly, even to help someone in need . . . Even if they’re saying you’ll be refunded, it is a scam.”
Scammers have for a second time impersonated the Archbishop of York and other clergy to ask priests and church staff to buy them Amazon vouchers and online gift cards https://t.co/uHDbKQn5Ez
— Church Times (@ChurchTimes) March 21, 2023