EXCLUSIVE: Criminals in Kent are making "six-figure sums" by taking control of people's sim cards
We can reveal a crime allowing criminals to take control of people's sim cards is "rocketing" in Kent.
Known as sim-jacking, criminals ring your network provider, pretending to be you, and ask to swap your sim to their own phone.
This allows them to gain access to everything on the victim's phone.
Detective Sergeant at Kent Police Darryll Paulson says criminals are making "six-figure sums" from this.
"You think about what's on your phone, they are into every single thing.
"People are vulnerable to having loans taken out in their names, all their money spent, their bank accounts accessed, their PayPal, and all their social media accounts."
Kent police figures show 102 reported offences in 2024 where ‘sim swapping’ was mentioned.
Detective Darryll Paulson says: "there's probably been 100x more offences in 2025 than 2024. The problem is rocketing."
Kent currently has 8 reports of sim swapping fraud that are being actively investigated, says Kent police.
A 27 year old woman and a 33 year old man in Folkestone were arrested and bailed on suspicion of the crime on 18 September.
In one case linked to the investigation, up to 30 fraudulent loan applications were submitted using a single victim’s identity.
Victims of the sim-jacking fraud were located in Avon and Somerset, Devon and Cornwall, Greater Manchester, West and East Yorkshire, and North Wales.
During the searches, officers recovered approximately £100,000 in cash and multiple mobile phones believed to be linked to E-SIM fraud.
The warning signs
Kent Police is advising the public to remain alert to the signs of SIM-swapping fraud.
These can include:
- an unexplained loss of mobile service
- notifications about account changes not initiated by the user
- unexplained transactions.
Advice
Detective Darryll Paulson told Greatest Hits and Hits Radio passkeys are "crucial" in protecting yourself.
"We're urging people to move away from passwords and towards passkeys, which are so much more secure.
"With passkeys, you don't have to put your password in.
"I would suggest to anyone thinking, how am I going to prevent this from happening to me every time you see a prompt that says would you like to use a passkey, sign up.
"It takes about 30 seconds to change your account over to a a pass key account rather than a password account that's got these vulnerabilities."
Safeguarding advice also includes using strong, unique passwords across all accounts and regularly updating mobile devices.