Rising interest rates prompted aged care worker Marylynne Desveaux to check her home loan account but what she discovered left her "beside herself" with stress and worry.
Desveaux, 60, lost nearly $40,000 of her retirement savings to a "sophisticated" impersonation scam where cyber criminals hacked into her ING account's payee contact list and changed the bank details of one of her contacts to a different account.
It allowed hackers to make multiple transfers under her friend Graham's name to a scammer's account, which seemingly bypassed the bank's cybersecurity triggers and allowed them to take the funds from 16 transactions over five days.
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Desveaux said Graham was the only addressee in the list and the last transaction from that account was in 2018.
"I rang him up and said, 'Graham are you getting some money from my account because it is showing it is going into your account?'" she told 9news.com.au.
They checked the account details and then realised it wasn't his account number.
Desveaux then contacted ING, which closed her accounts and asked her to get an IT specialist to check if she had any malware or viruses on her devices, which came back all-clear.
She then received a text from ING saying it couldn't recover her funds and was now waiting for an investigation to be completed to find out if she would get anything back.
"You can't just take somebody's money ... I'd be better off putting it under the mattress," Desveaux said.
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Desveaux said she was in the transition to retirement and had just built her savings back up after losing her job during the pandemic.
"I haven't slept for two weeks since all of this has been going on," Desveaux said.
"I don't know what to do.
"I'm trying every avenue possible to try and get back but mentally it's really affected me and it's affecting me healthwise because I've probably lost three or four kilos just in the last few weeks just stressing about it."
Have you got a story? Contact reporter Lucy Slade at lslade@nine.com.au
Desveaux said a woman from ING told her the bank couldn't explain how the hackers got in as it was "very sophisticated" and they got in "a different way than they normally would".
She has reported the hack to police and the Australian Financial Complaints Authority.
9news.com.au covered a story on a similar ING account hack last year, in which a mother on maternity leave had $10,000 taken from her account.
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A spokesperson for ING said the review was still underway and it was unable to comment on the individual case.
"In the event a customer is scammed we thoroughly investigate the matter and attempt to recover the money where possible," the spokesperson said.
"We do know the scams being deployed by criminal gangs are becoming increasingly sophisticated, are targeting multiple industries and are increasing in frequency.
"We regularly review and upgrade our security measures to provide our customers a safe and secure banking experience.
"We are also committed to educating our customers on the different types of scams and how they can protect themselves."
ING customers can call a dedicated scams line on 1800 052 743.
