National Anti-Scam Centre calls for business cooperation to stamp out scams
Reported losses to scam incidents rose to about $119 million in the first four months of the year despite a slight drop in overall reported cases.
The National Anti-Scam Centre, citing data from Scamwatch, said reported losses from scams reached $118,993,148 in the first four months of 2025.
This is up by 28% from the same time last year, but 38% below the $193.2 million in reported losses in the first four months of 2023.
The increase in losses comes despite a 24% drop in reported cases to 72,230, according to the centre.
"While the average and median losses per victim have slightly decreased, the rise in overall financial loss and the number of people being impacted is a reminder to stay alert," said Catriona Lowe, deputy chair of the Australian Competition and Consumer Commission, which oversees the centre.
According to the anti-scam centre, Australians lost $59 million to investment scams, accounting for more than half of all reported scam losses in early 2025, despite a 1.4% decrease from last year.
Phishing scams reported the biggest increase in reported losses during the period, accounting for $13.7 million in financial losses, up from the $4.6 million in early 2024.
Social media scams also saw a significant 50% increase in reports, hitting 3,300 reports totalling $23.4 million.
By age, Australians aged 65 and over logged the highest total losses of any age group, reaching $33.1 million. Younger Australians, however, were most likely to report that they lost money.
"Scams are affecting Australians of all ages, often beginning with an unprompted or unexpected contact via social media and other digital platforms," Lowe said.
"Our approach to scam prevention is grounded in partnership. Sharing information is a key step towards improving community safety – organisations, such as banks, digital platforms, and telecommunication companies, can help disrupt scams faster and reduce the harm they cause."
The ACCC chair urged Australians to report all incidents of suspicious spam activity, even if no money was lost, to provide the centre with vital intelligence.
"Businesses in all industries also need to stay alert to the risk of scams and adapt their systems to keep customers safe," she added.
The National Anti-Scam Centre recently took down more than 29,000 social media accounts and 1,850 fake job ads as part of its major crackdown on employment scams.
The crackdown saw a taskforce, called fusion cell, working with tech giants to eliminate accounts involved in scam activity in Australian Facebook groups.
"The work of our fusion cells has demonstrated that a piece of data that may be unremarkable on its own, when joined with other pieces of data, can form powerful intelligence," Lowe said.
"With data held across the ecosystem, sharing data with the National Anti-Scam Centre enables those vital connections to be made."
