A RETIRED widow lost hundreds of thousands of dollars after she waited for a phone call that never came.

Most of Marjorie Bloom’s life savings of $661,000 were gone following a supposedly common “tech scam.”

The retired civil servant, from Chevy Chase, Maryland had wired money to someone she believed was a “fraud investigator” at her bank PNC Bank, according to CNBC.

Bloom claimed that she had met the “fraud investigator” after a popup window froze her computer on April 22, 2021, and she rang the number on the screen which was listed as an apparent Microsoft customer support number.

After she rang the number, a supposed “Microsoft engineer” answered and told her that her accounts had been hijacked by foreign hackers and her personal data and financial accounts were at risk.

Bloom told the person that she banked with PNC Bank and the scammer then claimed he was a “fraud investigator”

After convincing Bloom to not tell anybody about what had happened she liquidated her nest egg, which included savings, stocks, and annuity.

Bloom reportedly made five transfers into cryptocurrency within 28 days, according to receipts viewed by CNBC.

Bloom said: “I fell for it. I didn’t tell anyone.”

The scammer supposedly told Bloom that if she informed anybody, even her three children, that she moved the money the operation could have been at risk.

She then awaited a phone call from the “investigator” on how she could retrieve her money but the line had been disconnected. 

Bloom found out what had happened after she called PNC Bank and was informed that the person she spoke to was not an employee there.

She said: “All of a sudden, this grayness lifted.

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“I realized I had been defrauded of everything.

“This was my life savings. 

“It’s what I was going to live on as a retiree.”

Bloom sued PNC Bank in May 2022 for full financial restitution and other damages.

She argued the bank ignored “obvious red flags” and “textbook evidence” of financial exploitation in her wire transfers and claimed they had acted negligently, according to CNBC. 

In February 2023 a federal judge in the District of Columbia dismissed Bloom’s negligence claim but allowed a breach of contract claim to move forward in court. 

Bloom and PNC later settled the lawsuit in September.

A spokesperson for PNC told CNBC that: “PNC maintains a comprehensive set of security controls to help protect our customers from increasingly sophisticated fraud threats and, when possible, we do our best to recover funds on behalf of impacted customers.

“While PNC regrets any losses incurred by a customer, we disagree with the allegations in this case and believe we acted appropriately with respect to these transactions.”

It is unclear how much the parties settled for but Bloom does regularly receive her federal pension payments. 

Bloom said: “I’m not starving but I could do a lot more [if I hadn’t lost money].”

Cyber fraud crimes against Americans over 60 years old have risen.

$3.1billion was lost due to tech scams on people over 60 in 2022, which was an 84 percent increase from 2021, according to the FBI.

The US Sun has reached out to PNC Bank for comment.