BETHESDA, Md. — A youth rugby team in Montgomery County says hackers stole thousands of dollars from their bank account, leaving the team struggling ahead of the upcoming season.
Head coach of the Maryland Exiles Youth Rugby Club tell WUSA9 that hackers emptied emptied their bank account in September of 2023. Over the course of two weeks, Coach Smith said hackers made fraudulent withdrawals, taking $300 at a time, and sending it to an unknown CashApp account, totaling $17,000.
“They cloned and hacked into one of our coach’s CashApp and made 59 transactions from our bank account, right under the amount to trigger anything.” Coach Smith says.
Coach Smith says the money stolen is typically used to fund team events, and provide scholarships to players in need. The rugby teams are made up of about 100 players between the ages of 5-18.
“Our community has rallied around us. Those $5-$10 dollar donations has helped us make sure we are good, but at the end of the day there are bigger things we want to do so we are trying to recover that $17,000.” Coach Smith says.
The team has a major tournament coming up in May. They’ve been relying on their community for support and donations.
When WUSA 9 reached out to CashApp, a spokesperson said, "We cannot comment on specific customer cases to protect the privacy of our customers.".
Coach Smith says it’s still unclear if they’ll get their money back.
For now, the team is taking extra precautions to make sure this doesn’t happen again.
“This has brought our board together, we try to be forward thinking. We’ve restructured. Now we have notifications on for even $5.00 is moved to our account. Also saying hey, this is a tough blow, what can we do better.” Coach Smith said.
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