Metro Bank customer fights for £14,000 refund after AI-linked fraud
Summary
A Metro Bank customer lost over £14,000 when fraudsters used his debit card to buy credits for Claude (an AI chatbot made by Anthropic) after his card details were compromised. Although the bank initially blocked one suspicious transaction when the customer said it was unauthorized, subsequent fraudulent transactions continued for a day before the card was fully frozen. Metro Bank refunded the customer after media attention, and Anthropic also provided a refund after the customer contacted its support site.
Solution / Mitigation
Anthropic states that 'anyone who has been charged for a fraudulent purchase should contact its support site and the charges will be refunded.' Additionally, the source quotes Metro Bank's advice: 'We would encourage customers to contact their bank as soon as they notice any unusual transactions or are aware of any compromise to accounts where their financial details are stored.'
Classification
Affected Vendors
Related Issues
Original source: https://www.theguardian.com/money/2026/aug/04/metro-bank-refund-ai-fraud
First tracked: August 4, 2026 at 02:00 PM
Classified by LLM (prompt v3) · confidence: 85%