Further, the A$26m figure is equivalent to 84% of the total losses recorded for all of 2017.
Losses ‘horrific’
ACCC deputy chair Delia Rickard said: “The losses to investment scams are horrific. Each week, the ACCC receives heartbreaking accounts of people losing hundreds of thousands, and in some cases millions of dollars.
“Last year, Australians reported they lost A$64.6m to investment scams to Scamwatch and the Australian Cybercrime Online Reporting Network (Acorn).
“If the current trend continues, combined losses reported to Scamwatch and Acorn in 2018 could be in excess of A$100m,” Rickard said.
She said the vast majority of scams continue to be centred on traditional investment markets like stocks, real estate and commodities.
“Scammers will spend significant time and effort grooming their victims to invest. They will use the right technical language and also offer professional looking websites and documents to convince victims they are legitimate. It’s often only when people try to cash out their investment that they realise their money is gone,” Rickard said.
Crypto scams on the rise
Two other types of investments where scams are prevalent, Rickards said, are cryptocurrency trading and binary options.
Cryptocurrency trading scams have grown significantly in the past 12 months and are now the second most common type of investment scam offer pushed on victims.
“The rise in popularity in cryptocurrency trading has not been missed by scammers who are latching onto this new trend to con people.
“These are similar to any other investment scam: the scammer will claim to have inside knowledge about price movements they will use to make you a fortune. If you invest, your money will quickly disappear,” she said.
