This will be led by ASIC and ACCC
The National Anti-Scam Centre will organise its first fusion cell to combat the growing problem, which is costing Australians more than $1 billion a year.
A fusion cell is a time-limited task force designed to bring together expertise from government and the private sector to take timely action to address specific, urgent problems.
The National Anti-Scam’s Centre will set up an investment scam fusion cell initially for six months to identify methods for disrupting investment scams to minimise scam losses.
Actions will include early intervention to disrupt investment scams, removing investment scam websites from the internet, sharing information about investment scam activity to assist the private sector to take disruption action, raising awareness regarding investment scams, and identifying intelligence to refer to law enforcement in Australia and overseas.
The investment scam fusion cell will be led by the ACCC and ASIC and include representatives from banks, telecommunications industry, and digital platforms.
Catriona Lowe, ACCC deputy chair, said the National Anti-Scam Centre targets investment scams because they lead to the highest level of reported individual losses and cause emotional devastation for victims.
“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,” Lowe said. “This additional level of coordination and focus across government and relevant industries will target investment scam activity more effectively and help prevent further losses to these scams.”
Sarah Court, ASIC deputy chair, lauded the initiative and said ASIC was looking forward to sharing its expertise in investment scams with the National Anti-Scam Centre.
“ASIC and the ACCC working together as part of the National Anti-Scam Centre’s first fusion cell is an important step towards protecting Australians from harmful investment scams,” Court said. “A collaborative approach that sees regulators working with each other, as well as with the private sector, is crucial to addressing this challenge.”
Launched on July 1, the National Anti-Scam Centre will build capability and data-sharing technology over the next three years to be able to receive a report of a scam from any institution and centralise this intelligence, distribute data to banks and to others who need it the most, and analyse and act on the trends sourced from this data to disrupt scams and educate Australians.
The National Anti-Scam Centre said it is also planning to coordinate a series of fusion cells with different participants to target particular scam types.
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