The ACCC has launched a podcast series for this year’s National Scams Awareness Week to provide Australians with tips on how to protect their personal and financial details from scammers.
Data from the ACCC’s annual Targeting Scams report, released this week, indicates scammers don’t discriminate and are targeting a range of different communities in Australia.
Scammers are using new online platforms to take advantage of their victims, with dating and romance scams making up one fifth of losses across all scams reported to Scamwatch in 2019.
Australians who are older, Indigenous or have disability reported record losses in 2018 according to the ACCC’s annual Targeting Scams report released this week.
Scamwatch is urging tech-savvy daters to be on the lookout for romance scammers this Valentine’s Day as data shows these scams are increasingly happening through social media and dating apps.
The ACCC is warning people to be wary of scammers when looking for romance online with social media now the most common method scammers use to contact potential victims.