Authorities have warned Australians to take precautions against fake text messages pretending to be from banks as more victims report losing their life savings due to sophisticated scams.
According to the Australian Competition and Consumer Commission’s (ACCC) Scamwatch, there were 14,603 reports of bank impersonation in 2022, resulting in a loss of $20 million (US$13.34 million).
If counting all the losses caused by phone and text scams, the figure soars to over $169 million, a significant increase compared to the $111 million loss in 2021.
However, the real loss was likely to be many times higher, with Scamwatch pointing out that only a small portion of scam victims report to the agency….