Scams are a big problem in Australia with billions lost each year. The problem is so bad, in fact, that it seems the government is taking action.
It’s no shock that scammers are hitting the wallets and identities of everyone, but every year, Australians are losing out in a big year.
Last year alone, the amount saw a little under three billion dollars lost from reported scams. The year before it managed to see even more lost. It’s pretty clear scammers are making an impact with deception, and everyone is feeling it.
While certain generations are hit more aggressively than others, no one is immune and everyone is a target.
As a result, the government is getting involved, and not just with the ACCC’s Scamwatch program.
The Australian federal government has announced a Scams Prevention Framework for legislation that will effectively make it possible for banks, telcos, and social media services to be held responsible if scams are detected and nothing is done. Fines of up to $50 million will be possible from this scams code, with services essentially being held accountable if nothing is done, forcing them to act and respond the moment a scam is detected.
That could include a scam on a social media service, or even one hiding behind ads, something you may not find providers running due diligence on, with fraudulent ads found all too easily.
The scam code wouldn’t likely see a fine issued for each scam found on the service. However, when each finds a scam, they could be held responsible for failing to act, and failing to prevent victims in the process.
“Australians are losing too much money to scams and while we’ve bucked the international trend where scams are doubling every year, losses are still far too much,” said Stephen Jones, Assistant Treasurer and Minister for Financial Services.
“The way to address that is to put strong obligations on the key businesses within the scam’s ecosystem,” he said.
Even before this, Australians were beginning to see some action from providers on these areas, most notably with telcos and even the odd bank.
Telstra operates its Cleaner Pipes program to reduce the number of scam calls, and its Scam Indicator program works in partnership with CommBank to work out when the bank’s customers are in the process of being scammed with an attempted money transfer while actively on the phone.
“We welcome a more coordinated approach to monitoring and disrupting scams and recognise the benefit in greater cross-sector coordination that includes banks and digital platforms, supported by industry specific codes,” said a spokesperson for Telstra.
“Telstra is already taking action to block millions of suspicious scam calls, SMS and internet scams from reaching our customers every day, and we continue to evolve our systems, technology and tactics in combatting the tactics of scammers.”
While the addition of a scams code may not help those who have already lost money to scammers thus far, it could help prevent further losses down the track, strengthening consumer rights as the service providers are forced to take action with better protections.
