Fraud & Scams Watch

The U.S. Department of the Treasury’s Financial Crimes Enforcement Network published an alert on Sept. 3, 2026, revealing that approximately $12.7 billion in financial activity tied to suspected digital asset investment scams flowed through the U.S. financial system between September 2023 and December 2025.

The alert, designated FIN-2026-Alert005, urges financial institutions to detect, identify and report suspicious activity connected to overseas scam centers and the laundering of illicit proceeds, according to reporting published by The National Law Review.

Singapore has proposed financial penalties of up to S$10 million for designated online services that breach anti-scam requirements under legislation debated in Parliament on 8 September.

The Scams (Countermeasures) and Other Matters Bill would also grant police wider powers to disable suspected scam accounts and introduce caning and prison terms for online account mules, Fintech News Singapore reports.

Singapore-headquartered fintech firm Embed Financial Group Holdings appeared in court on Sept 9 for failing to pay $312,484 in mandatory Central Provident Fund contributions for six employees.

The court ordered the firm to pay $100,000 by Sept 30 after a company representative asked for an extension to finalize funding from foreign investors, according to The Straits Times.

– With The Straits Times

DBS Bank is facing an estimated $1.3 billion damages lawsuit linked to the 1MDB scandal, DBS Group said on Sept. 9, according to Reuters.

The claimants include the liquidators of four companies: Blackrock Commodities (Global), Platinum Global Luxury Services, Affinity Equity International Partners and TKIL Global Investments. DBS rejected the claim, said it would fight it vigorously and added that it has made no provision for the lawsuit.

– With Reuters The Straits Times reports.

The United States government targeted the Chinese-language Telegram-based platform Xinbi Guarantee with sanctions and seized $52.8 million from connected wallets on Wednesday, according to the Justice Department.

Created in 2022, the platform processed at least $24 billion in transactions and served as an escrow service for vendors offering money laundering services, stolen personal data and deepfake technology, The Record reports.

Singapore will pilot a common prefix for official government calls later in 2026 to help the public identify impersonation scams, Fintech News Singapore reports.

The Singapore Police Force will test the prefix before wider adoption across government agencies, according to MAS Deputy Chairman Chee Hong Tat.

Auckland Transport warned drivers not to scan QR codes on parking meters on Monday following the discovery of fraudulent stickers in the city centre.

“AT does not use QR codes on any of our parking meters or machines,” said Rick Bidgood, the agency's head of transport and parking compliance, in a press release, Scoop reports.

More than a million students, parents, guardians and teachers across Australia and New Zealand have been caught up in a data breach after hackers accessed an internal Mathspace system and stole personal details, Education Review reports.

There was no immediate word from the company regarding the incident, and further details on the security compromise were not immediately available.

New guidance published on Monday by the Real Estate Authority requires salespeople to disclose methamphetamine contamination beyond 15 micrograms per 100 square centimetres as a property defect, RNZ reports.

Real Estate Authority Chief Executive Belinda Moffat said the rules aim to protect buyers and provide clarity, noting that the authority has handled 12 methamphetamine-related matters in the last 3 years, RNZ business (NZ) reports.

MP Jessica Tan proposed real-time cross-platform alerts, pre-emptive account restrictions and mandatory rapid response protocols in parliament on Tuesday.

She urged government agencies to continue working closely with industry players for faster detection, quicker escalation and rapid takedowns, CNA reports.

A 22-year-old man pleaded guilty to federal charges in the United States after leading a crew that stole $339 million in bitcoin from a Washington resident. Malone Lam faces a maximum prison sentence of 20 years following his guilty plea to a federal racketeering conspiracy charge, according to prosecutors.

Lam and his co-conspirators used social engineering to dupe the victim out of more than 4,100 bitcoin in August 2024, posing as representatives of Google and the Gemini cryptocurrency exchange. Prosecutors said the group used the laundered proceeds during a month-long spending spree that included luxury sports cars, mansions in Miami and a $US2 million watch before Federal Bureau of Investigation agents arrested Lam, Michael Kunzelman reports for The Age (business).

A 22-year-old man pleaded guilty in a US federal court to a racketeering conspiracy charge for stealing $339 million in bitcoin from a Washington resident.

Malone Lam faces a maximum prison sentence of 20 years, according to prosecutors. US District Judge Colleen Kollar-Kotelly didn’t immediately schedule a sentencing hearing in Washington.

Lam led a network of young men who carried out cryptocurrency scams starting in 2023, prosecutors said. He is the 11th defendant to plead guilty out of 18 individuals charged in the case, Michael Kunzelman reports for SMH business (AU).

Malone Lam pleaded guilty to racketeering charges on Tuesday for leading a scam ring that stole more than $245 million in cryptocurrency, according to The Record.

Lam, 22, will appear in U.S. District Court in Washington D.C. on December 8 for sentencing, which carries a prison term ranging from 7 to 20 years. Prosecutors said the group used social engineering tactics, including impersonating customer service representatives from Apple and Google to access victim accounts.

– With The Record

A victim in the Ards and north Down area lost £250,000 after falling for an AI-generated investment scam featuring a well-known financial figure, the Police Service of Northern Ireland reports.

Police said the fraudsters made initial contact through WhatsApp, gained remote access to the victim's computer, and persuaded them to borrow money for further transfers into accounts controlled by the criminals, according to the BBC.

– With Yahoo News Australia

Americans reported a record $15.9 billion in fraud losses last year, representing a 25% increase from 2024 according to Federal Trade Commission figures cited by the Associated Press and FRONTLINE.

Federal Trade Commission estimates put actual losses for 2024 closer to $200 billion as many victims decline to report crimes due to embarrassment, WCCB Charlotte reports.

Employers are increasingly using Australian Business Numbers to misclassify temporary visa holders and avoid paying legal entitlements, according to a major new study. Researchers found international students alone may be short-changed by around $3.18 billion per year.

Assoc. Prof. Bassina Farbenblum of the Migrant Justice Institute said the study heard from close to 10,000 migrant workers in Australia. The research was commissioned by the Commonwealth attorney-general's department and points to widespread practices replacing traditional cash-in-hand underpayments.

– With ABC News Migrant-targeted fraud reports.

Uber is cutting about 3,300 jobs globally, roughly 10 per cent of its 34,000-person workforce, chief executive Dara Khosrowshahi said in a memo to staff on Wednesday AEST. An Uber spokesperson confirmed Australian employees are among those affected but would not say how many. The company employed 568 staff in Australia as of 31 December.

Khosrowshahi said Uber's revenue had nearly tripled over five years but growth had created extra management layers and unclear decision-making. The cuts would make the company "simpler and faster", he said. The company will reinvest the savings, including a previously flagged commitment of more than $US10 billion to autonomous vehicles. Uber shares rose on the announcement, David Swan reports for The Age.

A woman in New Zealand has been accused of acting as a money mule in a scheme that defrauded four retirees of their life savings, according to reporting by Stuff. The woman allegedly helped move funds obtained through an investment scam, with authorities investigating her role in laundering what is described as a million-dollar operation.

The victims, all retired, were approached with promises of high returns on their investments before their money disappeared. Police and fraud investigators are examining how the funds were moved and the network behind the scheme.

Former television production executive Alex Breingan has lost a legal bid to lift an arrest warrant in New Zealand, the NZ Herald reports.

Breingan, who is based in Los Angeles, faces 33 fraud and forgery charges involving $14.5 million.

There was no immediate comment from Breingan on the ruling, Shayne Currie reports for NZ Herald business.

Scammers are increasingly impersonating banks by setting up fake call centres with hold music and automated menus to trick customers into handing over account details, according to Commonwealth Bank.

Shannon Brown, CommBank's fraud and scams industry, intelligence and disruption senior manager, said callers often recite the first six digits of a card to appear legitimate, though those numbers are standard bank identification figures rather than personal data, AU scams reports.

An immigration adviser who fleeced at least nine clients and committed 123 breaches of the code cannot practice for five years, the licensing regime's tribunal said on 2 September 2026.

Qian Yu, also known as Heidi Castelucci, carried on advising after being suspended and kept $8000 of a client's student fees for her own purposes, according to the tribunal decision reported by RNZ.

"The public would call such conduct theft," the tribunal said.

– With RNZ RNZ business (NZ) reports.

Consumer protection authorities are warning patients about a new phishing campaign impersonating the MyChart patient portal to steal passwords and personal information, according to the Pennsylvania Office of Attorney General.

Fraudulent text messages and emails offer recipients an unsolicited reward called a 'MyChart Medicare Kit', which officials say does not exist, Indonesian scams reports.