Review – Confessions of Teenage Fraudster – Episode 1, BBC, 5 June 2024

Confessions of a Teenage Fraudster is a three-part docuseries that details the exploits of Elliott Castro, a Glaswegian born in 1982, who became a notorious credit card fraudster who racked up debts over £2.5m.

Castro narrates his own story, which is interspersed with stock footage, with insights from the police, and a psychologist.  This is understandable as white-collar crime is often transactional in nature and computer based, so any producer would have a hard time making computer servers and keyboards attractive.

The first episode starts with Castro leaving school at 16 with no qualifications and lying about his age (an immediate red flag if ever there was one), to secure a job in call centre processing customer credit card orders for mobile phones.

With some bravado, Castro would telephone customers back by pretending to be calling from their bank and ask for their security details, e.g. mother’s maiden name. Once he was in possession of these, he would act as the cardholder, change the address on the account and order a new credit card to be delivered to his home address.

On receipt of the card, he would change the mailing address back and go on a spending spree, buying designer goods and travel first-class around the world. For a young man who grew up in the Glasgow, which is now twinned with Mykolaiv, Ukraine rather than Monaco, this was nirvana.

Initially Castro comes over as a young man who had the intellect and audacity to beat the system but this soon evaporates as he resorts to stealing cards in bars and clubs to fuel his spending habits. An attempt by Castro to normalise his criminal behaviour by coming to terms with his homosexuality in Manchester’s gay scene comes across as disingenuous.

It is only when Castro is arrested for impersonating a doctor and for assaulting a female patient does he show some remorse. “It made me feel sick to be honest,” he says but qualifies his actions by saying his “intention was only to help the lady”.  

Castro was eventually sentenced to four months imprisonment but he admits he did not use the time to turn his life around but instead uses the time to concentrate on devising new methods of card fraud. At this point one questions whether there is a need to watch episodes 2 and 3 of the series as Castro was unscrupulous conman.

Today Castro is a reformed character and advises banks on fraud prevention but this role is not explored by the series. Modern day controls such as chip and pin, two factor identification, call-backs and background checks for anyone who works in financial services are not discussed. The latter may have detected Castro’s falsification of his age.

Given the banks and credit card companies employ legions of IT professionals, info-sec specialists, internal auditors and advisors from the Big 4 accountancy firms to prevent financial fraud and losses, Castro either knows something they don’t (clue, probably not), or is he simply acting the part again?