The e-money firm, founded in 2015 by two former bankers, has nine million customers in the UK and announced record annual profits last year of £438m.
Revolut was also named in more reports of fraud than any other major UK bank, according to figures collected last year by Action Fraud – the UK’s national reporting centre for fraud and cyber-crime.
In Dr Kumar’s case, the Revolut feature which enabled the scammers to spend his money was the creation of virtual debit cards.
These work the same way as a physical debit card except they only exist in the digital world.
They can offer customers more security because you can make online purchases without providing the details of your main card.
It’s among a list of features which some of Revolut’s competitors don’t offer.
Others include the option to hold money in different currencies, transfer it abroad, buy individual stocks, invest in commodities and access cryptocurrencies.
This range of features gives Revolut a broad appeal – it describes itself as an “all-in-one finance app for your money” – but it’s also what cyber security experts warn could be a weakness.
“It’s like putting all your eggs in one basket,” says Prof Mark Button, who researches cybercrime.
“If you have a product which can link to all the different aspects of your financial life, and you get compromised by a fraud or scam, then that is highly dangerous.”
While Revolut offers many features – one thing it doesn’t have is an emergency phone number you can call to freeze your account. You have to ask them using their app’s chat function.
A dedicated phone number might have helped Lynne Elms stop scammers taking £160,000 in seven minutes from her employer.
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