A live-curated feed of Australia's fraud and scam stories — bank impersonation, AI-driven investment cons, crypto fraud and regulator warnings — updated as new reports emerge.
The Financial Register Newsroom · Started 29 August
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.
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.
More than one million people across Australia and New Zealand have been implicated in a data breach after attackers exploited an unpatched vulnerability in tutoring platform Mathspace, according to the company.
Mathspace disclosed that unauthorised parties accessed an internal reporting system and downloaded records including names, email addresses and user IDs on 1,079,819 students, parents, teachers and staff members on September 3, Cyber Daily reports.
An anonymous security researcher has released a zero-day exploit named FalconFlank that allows privilege escalation on fully updated Windows systems running CrowdStrike Falcon. BleepingComputer reports that the exploit abuses the security platform's office malicious macros remediation feature to spawn a command prompt with SYSTEM privileges.
CrowdStrike is investigating the claims and advises customers to disable a specific Microsoft Office Windows policy setting, according to BleepingComputer. Cybersecurity expert Kevin Beaumont confirmed on Thursday that the privilege escalation exploits released by the researcher are real and operational.
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.
Telstra has paid a $277,200 penalty after failing to use mandatory identity checks in 15 unauthorised SIM swap incidents between January and October 2025, the Australian Communications and Media Authority said. The regulator also found 13 instances where staff did not offer extra fraud protections to high-risk customers, leaving them vulnerable to mobile scams that resulted in combined losses of at least $39,500.
"When a telco becomes aware that a customer is at risk of fraud involving their service, it must offer protections that are additional or tailored to the situation," said ACMA Authority Member Samantha Yorke. "These failures exposed Telstra's customers to real harm." As part of the penalty, Telstra must overhaul its fraud prevention processes and improve training for customer-facing staff. This is the seventh enforcement action in ACMA's crackdown on mobile number fraud, with telecommunications providers paying over $5 million in total penalties to date, AU data breach reports.
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.
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.
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.
A Gold Coast filmmaker accused of multimillion-dollar fraud will face a fresh trial after a judge dismissed the jury on Tuesday. Judge Glen Cranny discharged the jury in Brisbane's District Court following late evidence introduced by the prosecution.
Luke Sparke, 42, has pleaded not guilty to 17 counts of fraud over offences allegedly committed between February 2017 and November 2019. The charges relate to loans secured to make his movies while he was a bankrupt, according to The Age reporting.
A 16-year-old boy using a sophisticated counterfeit driver's licence gambled at Sydney casinos on 22 separate occasions, prompting $2.25 million in combined fines to Crown Sydney and Star Sydney, The Age reports. The teenager also visited at least seven clubs and pubs where he played poker machines and entered tournaments, but those venues have not been penalised, partly because they lack the mandatory card-based identity systems required at casinos.
Liquor & Gaming NSW said it is making inquiries into the non-casino venues but did not pursue the allegations as vigorously as it did at the casinos. The agency would need to review extensive CCTV footage to build a case, which may no longer exist. Clubs NSW said venues should not face penalties if a minor used a convincing fake ID and staff took reasonable steps to verify identity, and called for stronger action against ID manufacturers.
Australian police and the FBI arrested two men on Wednesday 26 August following an international investigation into the hacking group TeamPCP.
Western Australia Police Force and FBI officers arrested two Australians aged 21 and 23, laying a combined 14 charges over attacks on open source packages and private GitHub repositories, according to police.
“Our investigators are relentless in tracking down criminals who attempt to exploit digital anonymity to attack our community,” said Australian Federal Police Commander Graeme Marshall, AFP / police reports.
Home insurers are overwhelmingly paying cash to settle claims rather than managing repairs, leaving vulnerable Australians to shoulder unexpected costs, according to a report released on Monday by the Australian Securities and Investments Commission.
The corporate regulator reviewed a sample of home building claims from Cyclone Jasper, which hit far north Queensland in December 2023, and found cash settlements were used in more than 63% of final claims.
"The easy option for insurers can be the expensive one for homeowners," ASIC commissioner Alan Kirkland said, adding that consumers were often left paying the difference out of their own pocket when payouts fell short, Luca Ittimani reports for Guardian business.
Commonwealth Bank is warning customers about callback scams that use automated phone menus and hold music to mimic legitimate banking channels, Central Queensland Today reports.
Shannon Brown, CommBank's fraud and scams industry, intelligence and disruption senior manager, said scammers often cite the first six digits of a card to build trust, though those numbers are standard bank identification numbers common across card types.
The federal government will release draft legislation on Monday updating Australia's privacy laws to address artificial intelligence and smart glasses. Attorney-General Michelle Rowland said the changes will introduce a right to erasure for personal data held by social media and search companies.
The package includes IDLock, a new online safeguard for identity documents to be added to myGov accounts in 2027 following an initial trial. The system will allow users to block, unblock and monitor their credentials to protect against scams and identity theft, according to Rowland.
Australia, the US, Canada and New Zealand backed a package of UK-led measures on Wednesday to strengthen international action against online scams and fraud networks. The agreement was reached at the Five Country Ministerial in Sydney, according to the UK Home Office.
Home Secretary Shabana Mahmood said in a statement that criminal gangs do not respect borders and that international cooperation must be deepened to track down fraudsters. The new measures include faster intelligence-sharing to identify cross-border fraud operations and coordinated action to shut down criminal accounts and communications channels.
The Securities and Exchange Commission warned the public on Thursday against an advance-fee loan scam involving an individual impersonating a representative of Bestloan Finance and Leasing Inc.
An individual introducing himself as Urise Loteryo Lean used falsified notarized loan contracts and required borrowers to pay processing fees to a GoTyme account, according to the corporate regulator, Inquirer business (PH) reports.
Marith Khao, 34, was sentenced in Hamilton District Court on Wednesday to 18 months in jail for money laundering, receiving stolen property and using a document for pecuniary advantage across three separate incidents over two years.
In the first case, scammers impersonating ANZ Bank convinced a 77-year-old Christchurch woman to transfer $24,000 into Khao's account by claiming her account had been compromised. The caller, claiming to be "Robert Diego", spent four hours persuading the victim and used her voice as a security override. Khao then distributed the money across his accounts. A third party made withdrawals totalling $21,478.70 the same day.
In the second incident, Khao used a stolen Westpac Mastercard from a 39-year-old man's wallet to make two purchases totalling $295.90. In the third, he received $17,658 from a stolen Sharesies account after one of his associates stole a 43-year-old man's phone; Sharesies recovered $3000 of that amount. Khao also admitted deliberately crashing into a victim's car, causing $3500 damage.
Judge Glen Marshall said Khao's offending was "particularly callous" and showed "little empathy" for victims, RNZ reports.
A Singapore businesswoman lost $1.6 million when she used her own money to pay other investors in an attempt to salvage a failing investment, according to a report by The Straits Times.
Tan Ooi Boon reports that the woman believed the company would reimburse her with interest.
Scammers are using artificial intelligence to generate fake photographs and incorrect life details of Australian Holocaust survivors on Facebook to drive clicks and revenue, according to an AAP FactCheck investigation published by Yahoo News Australia.
Meta's page transparency feature revealed the posts originate from a network of spam accounts operated out of Pakistan, AAP reports.
Investors face millions in losses buying non-existent overseas homes after failing to make independent checks on unknown developers, according to a report published on Aug 29, 2026, by The Straits Times.
Buyers should avoid investing in overseas properties simply because they are cheaper than similar ones in Singapore, the publication reported.
Former Stripe Studios head Alex Breingan appeared in an Auckland court and entered a not guilty plea to 33 fraud and forgery charges, according to the NZ Herald.
The appearance marks his first in court to fight an arrest warrant, Shayne Currie reports for NZ Herald business.
