A TEENAGER who worked three jobs to save up for a house deposit by time she turned 18 lost it all in seconds during a phone call.
Aurora Casilli got her first job when she was 14 and has spent years saving every penny she possibly could to buy her own home.
At one stage, she was working three different jobs to add to her savings pot.
But Aurora, from Albany in Western Australia, lost all her cash after she was duped by a scammer.
She said she now "has nothing to her name" after all her years of hard work.
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"You never think something like this will happen to you," the 18-year-old told news.com.au.
"I’m devastated. I’ve worked hard all my life, I was saving for a house.
"Now I have nothing. I have to start all over again."
On December 3 last year, Aurora received a text message that she believed was from her bank - National Australia Bank.
It said someone with a name she didn't recognise was trying to make a transfer from her account.
The message was from the same number and in the same text message thread as previous communications from the bank.
The text urged her to call the bank if she had not authorised the payment.
Aurora said she decided to dial as she was in a "state of panic".
"I was just at home, about to make breakfast when the text came through,” she recalled.
"I panicked when I read it. All the money I had saved, and now I thought someone was in my account trying to make an unauthorised transfer.
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"It seemed legit to me, so I called the number in a panic.
“If it was from a random mobile number, I wouldn’t have believed it. But it seemed so real."
Aurora said she waited on hold for an hour - which made her believe the text message was legitimate.
She was then greeted by a "professional and polite" man - who explained someone had gained access to her bank account.
"He sounded like any normal person working at a bank," she said.
The man allegedly told Aurora to transfer all of her savings into another account with her bank - which the scammer was supposedly setting up for her on the phone.
Aurora said she sent over £20,000 - her entire life savings.
And seconds after confirming the transfer, the man hung up.
But she soon realised the money had been transferred to another bank entirely - Commonwealth - and not just another account with her own bank.
"I felt sick, I just got this gut feeling that something was terribly wrong,” she said.
"I called back, and asked why he wanted me to transfer the money into a Commonwealth account. He hung up again.
"That’s when it hit home, I’d been scammed."
When she called up the other bank where her money had been transferred, she was allegedly told there was nothing they could do.
“Once the funds are taken out, it is too late. I have no idea what happened to my money or what they are doing with it," she said.
Aurora now wants to warn others about phone scammers.
"I just want to raise awareness so this doesn’t happen to others,” she said.
"If it can happen to me, it could happen to anyone. It is so scary what these scammers can do.
"I’m honestly just heartbroken, and I hope nobody else will ever have to go through this."
According to a document seen by news.com.au, Aurora's bank, NAB, determined it was not liable for the lost funds after the payment being authorised by the teenager.
NAB said the bank was unable to comment on individual cases but stressed the importance of staying vigilant against scammers.