Revolut seeking a UK Bank Licence

Rather bad - but at least we know what’s going on rather than endless silence

Does it affect me as a user? Not really.

Only if they close down in the UK, which is possible

That would be a shitter. They’ve got a lot of users here using electronic money.

Wouldn’t that be cutting off their nose to spite their face?

Can’t see them doing that, pretty sure we’re their biggest market.

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I doubt that.

Sidenote: They are also seeking a banking licence in Australia

In a way, applying for and being rejected for a banking licence is worse (than just being e-money) as it shows the central bank and regulators don’t have confidence in them.

I’m keeping my pennies elsewhere.

The whole thing is indicative of the fact that most e-money providers don’t have anything near the amount of customers that Revolut do. The whole thing does seem like a hot mess from a regulatory perspective - but I doubt it impacts much on their ability to continue as they are now.

If I were using Revolut for my salary as in the past I’d just pop the funds into a FSCS vault

I’m sure you’re right. And that makes issuing (or not) a Banking license all the more significant.

I can see them remaining a big player in the e-money arena - but nothing greater.

I think they’ll probably get the license if they suck it up and get in line. Clearly the regulator isn’t a fan of having tech people in leadership positions and approaching finance as a tech company.

It does make you wonder whether being a bank in the UK suits their objectives though - so maybe they will give up on it?

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I’ve just been watching Scam Interceptors on BBC1. It appeared from watching a sophisticated scam operation in action, that the scammers were able to hack into Revoluts web chat service to try and convince the poor sod they were trying to rip off, that all was well after Revoluts own systems detected fraudulent activity.

Interesting stuff if that was indeed the case. No one would expect that any banks secure in app chat service could in fact be hacked by scammers, but it seems it’s possible.

Have you got a link to the program?

I strongly doubt that’s the case. Although not impossible, there’s no chance they’d air it if such a vulnerability existed. Unless they’re exposing an internal scam ring at Revolut?

The reality is more like one of these two things:

  1. A sophisticated man in the middle attack (let me know if you want to know more about this one and how it could be done).

  2. A much simpler impersonation attack (there’s so many ways of doing something like this and it would appear to the victim exactly as you describe).

I’d need to watch the show to know for sure what’s going on there, assuming enough is explained and shown. But it’s not a show I’ve ever heard of watched (likely because it’s the BBC).

You’ll find the program on BBC iPlayer, it’s hosted by Rav Wilding.

Watch the show and see what you think.

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Thanks both!

Do either of you know which episode it is? I’ve just watched season 2 episode 10 on 2X speed and Revolut didn’t feature in either of the scam situations shown.

Do have some notes though:

  1. This is a televised program replicating what vigilante white hats have been doing on YouTube for many many years.
  2. The situation with Nationwide in the first scam is exactly my worry over this sort of vigilanti-ism. They deploy many of the same techniques scammers use to scam people to stop the scams, which can wind up feeling like a scam itself. I think this can be dangerous and actually push a skeptic into falling for the original scam.
  3. They seem to be quite late into jumping into the scam and listening to what’s going, so a lot of context gets lost. In the second scam, although they show an iPhone, it won’t have been an iPhone user that was targeted for instance.
  4. Based on the call center they’re observing, and the two scams shown, I’m inclined to think it’s a combination of MITM and impersonation. The scammer will have access and control of your device, so that’s the MITM component, then they just need to impersonate Revolut which is the simplest part of the scam. If I find the Revolut episode I’ll come back and explain for certain exactly how it’s done, but for now, I wouldn’t worry about them hacking into Revolut, that won’t have been what’s happened.

As some general advice, be careful what links you click, never install anything outside your App Store,
And if your bank (or anyone) tries getting you to use screen sharing software, they’re not your bank and you should ignore them.

Sorry, no. I just searched for the link for you. Don’t actually watch the programme.

Update:

It is not Season 2, Episode 1, as I have just watched it. That is a Delhi Call Centre and Loans2Go referenced.

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To be fair, my scam avoidance technique is to just keep my phone on silence unknown callers (SUC). Lately, I’ve had at least 3 obvious scam calls a week that have been intercepted by SUC. None of the callers have left a voicemail clearly indicating they must be scammers and all of the numbers I block immediately that they come to my attention. Same with text messages which are generally really very easy to determine whether or not they are genuine.

That’s generally good practice, if a little OTT IMO. Just stay cautious of potential spoofing (already commonplace) and AI deepfakes which are about to start exploding with the trends I’m seeing personally.

They’re rare at the moment but there are now scams going about where someone will call you from a relative or friend’s phone number, and sound exactly like said relative or friend in distress. I’m actually surprised no one tried these scams with voice artists prior to the sudden AI uprising.

Email is probably the more prevalent attack vector you want to keep on top of too. That’s where they’re both more likely to catch you out, and go after you first before trying to get you on the phone. You can be just as draconian protecting yourself on that front too, but it’s relatively needless so long as you don’t click any links, or open any attachments.

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I never get spam or scam calls. If I go on the phone app I just see entries like this sometimes.

Also you can now screen calls if you’re not sure.

Whether one considers it fortunate or otherwise, the family and friends I do have, know never to call or approach me for financial reasons because they know they’d get sod all out of me :laughing: Hence why, any call or text or email involving a financial angle, I just completely ignore. I wouldn’t even acknowledge a so called distress or voicemail message because I’d be almost certain it would be fake. My Wife and I have had this discussion and we have an alternative method of communication in case of emergencies. At the end of the day, I’m never going to get into a conversation over a telephone or via text or email about my finances unless it’s me who has made contact.

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