Fraud Alert – Vishing Call (Impersonation of a medical professional)

We have received notification from Greater Manchester Integrated Care Partnership that a patient at a local GP practice has received a phone call from someone masquerading as a medical professional associated with their practice. They alleged they were a “senior health advisor” who worked alongside the practice in question.

The caller engaged the patient initially by asking about their medical problems, both old and ongoing. Once a rapport had been established, the caller then offered them some medication which they could try at a cost, then proceeded to ask for bank details to proceed with payment.

The number of the caller was 01900 516 559, a number that has been previously associated with fraudsters for vehicle accident insurance call scams.

Reporting Frauds (including cyber frauds) / Useful Information

Please contact primarycarefraud@miaa.nhs.uk for reporting attempts / successful frauds in order to share intelligence / alerts with other practices. We will need you to tell us who you are, where you are from and the details of the allegation. You may not receive a response unless an alert needs to be followed up following an initial assessment. Please do not use the email box for general fraud queries.

Attempts – If you are suspicious about an email you have received at work, tell your IT team and forward it to report@phishing.gov.uk.

Losses – If you believe you are the victim of a fraud, personally, please report this to Action Fraud as soon as possible on 0300 123 2040 or at https://www.actionfraud.police.uk/.

Other useful information:

Suspicious text messages at work or personally can be forwarded to the number 7726 (the National Cyber Security Centre – NCSC), which is free of charge.

You can also report fake company website details directly to the NCSC at https://www.ncsc.gov.uk/collection/phishing-scams/report-scam-website.

Good advice on various measures you can take to protect your cybersecurity arrangements in both your professional and personal life can be found at https://www.ncsc.gov.uk/.

You can report NHS frauds to the National Fraud & Corruption Reporting Line on 0800 028 4060, or via an online reporting tool at https://reportfraud.cfa.nhs.uk/

Caution: A Fraud Alert is not necessarily verified evidence of fraudulent activity. An alert is raised and circulated to other interested parties where a genuinely held concern has been raised by another source (within or outside of the NHS) about a suspected fraud, or where a potential fraud risk has been identified. An alert is intended to enable local fraud prevention checks to be undertaken, relevant local personnel to be notified and for the recipient(s) to act with caution in respect of the alert’s contents / subject matter. If actual evidence of fraudulent conduct exists, this will be made clear where appropriate / established.