Martin Lewis: finance guru urges This Morning viewer to contact Citizens Advice after scammer uses his identity

Martin Lewis has issued advice to victims of fraud after a viewer of ITV’s This Morning admitted they were scammed by someone using the money saving expert’s identity.

Martin, 50, from Manchester, joined hosts Holly Willoughby and Phillip Schofield for a segment providing financial advice to viewers who’ve contacted the show on Tuesday morning.

He claimed that he would never advertise cryptocurrencies or speak about Bitcoin on ITV daytime as he’s aware scammers would use it as an opportunity to con unsuspecting viewers of the show.

The money saving expert said incidents such as a viewer who lost over £10,000 to a fake crypto-currency advert make him feel “sick” as he expressed the difficulty of recouping the lost money.

Martin explained that there isn’t much he can do to help anyone who has lost money to scammers pretending to be him.

He advised victims to contact the Citizens Advice Consumer Helpline, which was set up after he sued Facebook.

Martin said: “When I sued Facebook about this, I settled for a £3 million donation to set up Citizens Advice scam action and you can get 1-1 scam help from the consumer helpline. Clearly the information given me isn’t enough for me to help you and to be honest, there’s not much I can do.

"It is very difficult to fix after it’s happened. So all those, especially This Morning fans, because Phil and Holly they use you as well, you’re often in the picture with me or by yourself. We don’t talk about this, this isn’t about Bitcoin, none of this has anything to do with crypto-currency, this is just what people do.

“They think that we can use what people trust, our faces, and what do people think will get them rich quickly… Bitcoin because people have heard of Bitcoin. They put the two together as a dog whistle to get people to think that these are proper get rich schemes, then they steal your money."

Martin explained that scammers will encourage victims to begin by investing a small amount, before convincing them to give large sums of money.

"They are sophisticated, clever and physiologically devious. You have to protect yourself, we have to keep getting the word out,” he added.

The caller had already contacted their bank about the scam before reaching out to ITV’s This Morning.

Many viewers were unsympathetic towards the victim of the scam as they took to Twitter to claim that they wouldn’t have been fooled by the deception.

One wrote: “So many gullible people about falling for these ridiculous scams ffs 🙄 #ThisMorning”

Another commented: “#ThisMorning Not so much a question for martin but an observation on these scams. None of them are particularly smart it only takes the time of reading what they have written to realise its a scam. Everyone of them with your name has numerous spelling mistakes and other errors”

A third said: “Martin has given this advice time & time again, weather it’s crypto, diet pills or any other crap chances are the celebs have not endorsed it.  Common sense guys  #ThisMorning”