The National Anti-Scam Centre, launched on 1 July 2023, has announced a new investment scam fusion cell to be led by Australia’s corporate and competition regulators.
Fusion cells are time-limited taskforces designed to bring together expertise from government and the private sector.
The investment scam fusion cell led by the ACCC and ASIC will include representatives from digital platforms, banks, and the telecommunications industry to identify methods to disrupt such scams, which cost Australians over $1 billion annually.
It will be set up for an initial six months and the National Anti-Scam Centre will publicly report its outcomes.
“Investment scams lead to the highest level of reported individual losses and cause emotional devastation for victims,” said Catriona Lowe, ACCC deputy chair.
“That is why the National Anti-Scam Centre is prioritising investment scam disruption as its first fusion cell in an initiative that facilitates timely action by finance, telecommunications, and digital platforms to stop scammers.”
ASIC deputy chair, Sarah Court, added that the fusion cell is an important step to protecting Australian consumers.
“A collaborative approach that sees regulators working with each other, as well as with the private sector, is crucial to addressing this challenge,” she said.
Among other considerations, the fusion cell will look to remove online investment scam websites, provide information to the public to avoid such scams, identify intelligence to refer to law enforcement agencies in Australia and overseas, and gather information to assist the private sector to take disruption action.
The centre had been flagged as part of an $86.5 million package in the 2023–24 budget in May to combat scams and online fraud. This will help “detect, disrupt, and deter scammers and tackle online fraud”, the government said at the time.
In April, the latest Targeting Scams report revealed Australians lost a record $3.1 billion to scams in 2022. With $3.1 billion lost last year, it marked an 80 per cent increase from 2021. Investment scams comprised $1.5 billion of the total losses and were the highest loss category.
Australians lost over $3 billion to scams in 2022 and scam losses have increased nearly fivefold since 2020. The average loss from a scam is around $20,000.
Previously, Minister for Financial Services, Stephen Jones, has described scams as “a menace” and “a destructive force” in the economy.
