The number of Aussies being lured into scams by hard-to-spot AI-created videos is increasing at an alarming rate, with catastrophic results.<\/p>\n
This week, the Australian Securities and Investments Commission (ASIC) warned of a sharp rise in online scams using deepfake videos of celebrities and politicians to encourage Australians to part with their money, revealing it removed more than 19,400 online scams \u2013 up 182 per cent on the previous year – including fake websites, social media ads, phishing scams and cryptocurrency investment scams.<\/p>\n
And while we might be getting better at spotting AI in the wild (farewell the em-dash, you had a good run), this one area in which Aussies are increasingly getting fooled is contributing to the billions being lost by Aussies to financial scams each year.<\/p>\n
<\/p>\n
According to data from ScamWatch and other agencies, Australians lost over $2.18 billion financial scams in 2025, and experts warn that total may continue to rise due to AI innovations that make targeting victims at scale as simple as clicking a button.<\/p>\n
\u201cAI, along with social media, is one of the biggest vectors that has changed the game for scammers recently,\u201d Westpac\u2019s head of fraud prevention Ben Young told news.com.au, adding that there are almost infinite ways in which the technology allows fraudsters to scale their operations. <\/p>\n
\u201cObviously, AI allows you to produce huge amounts of content and lengthy, official-looking documents.<\/p>\n
\u201cSo for romance-scammers, suddenly they can create pages and pages of romantic poetry and love letters to their victims. And that\u2019s before we even talk about the deep fakes.\u201d<\/p>\n
Rise of the deepfake investment endorsement <\/p>\n
Deepfakes – synthetic media such as images, video or audio that have been manipulated to make it appear someone said or did something they did not actually do or say – have sparked a proliferation in investment scams. <\/p>\n
In 2025, Australians lost a staggering $837.7 million to investment scams, the most financially damaging of all types. <\/p>\n
The most impersonated public figures in FY26 included Anthony Albanese, Jacqui Lambie, Angus Taylor, Tom Piotrowski and Alan Kohler, according to the National Anti-Scam Centre (NASC).<\/p>\n
\u201c(Scammers) make fake Anthony Albanese or Gina Rinehart endorsements of some investment scheme, which of course social media is full of now,\u201d Mr Young said.<\/p>\n
\u201cAI is being used in a lot of places, especially when you combine it with social media. Social media platforms give a wonderful way to target victims because those platforms will target particular ads to particular people that have got particular search history or interests, and so scammers are not just sending out snail mail to random addresses in Australia – they\u2019re sending targeted investment ads to people who have just googled investment opportunities, so they think they\u2019ve stumbled upon them independently.\u201d<\/p>\n
Online scams up 182 per cent on the previous year<\/p>\n
ASIC chair Sarah Court warned that scammers create a network of fake sites endorsing scams, meaning that even when potential victims independently google the \u201copportunity\u201d, they\u2019re served content that legitimises it. <\/p>\n
\u201cThe presence of polished content, familiar branding or convincing testimonials does not mean an investment is legitimate,\u201d Ms Court cautioned.<\/p>\n
\u201cAI is making investment scams more convincing and harder to detect. A simple online search is not enough to verify whether an opportunity is legitimate.\u201d<\/p>\n
The target demographic for investment scams is Australians over the age of 65.<\/p>\n
\u201cOlder Australians represent 50 per cent (the total financial) loss, even though they don\u2019t represent 50 per cent of the victims,\u201d Mr Young said.<\/p>\n
\u201cOlder Australians simply have more money to lose, and they get targeted, particularly through these AI-generated scams.\u201d<\/p>\n
Thanks to LLMs, now even basic scam operations are able to generate quality-looking investment prospectuses, official \u201cdashboard\u201d views showing impressive returns and stage lengthy swindles with a fraction of the work required. <\/p>\n
\u201cAI also smoothes over language barriers as well. In the past, you needed to speak English pretty well if you wanted to try and scam English speaking victims,\u201d Mr Young said. <\/p>\n
\u201cNow, we often see scams where people are using automatic translation services in real time, and can get convincing English even if they don\u2019t speak it natively.\u201d<\/p>\n
With AI voice cloning also playing into people\u2019s preconceptions about the stereotype of a scammer, Mr Young adds \u201cI can\u2019t tell you how many people we hear from who have been scammed and say they were speaking to someone with a posh British accent on the other end of the phone.\u201d<\/p>\n
ASIC revealed it took down 5476 phishing hyperlinks in FY25, up 279 per cent from the previous year, as well as removing 7051 fake investment platforms (up 151 per cent) and 3106 cryptocurrency investment scams (up almost 30 per cent).<\/p>\n
Scamwatch has three simple steps to help Australians avoid scams online:<\/p>\n
\u2022 Stop before you share money or personal information<\/p>\n
\u2022 Check who you\u2019re really dealing with using contact details you find yourself<\/p>\n
\u2022 Protect yourself and others by reporting scams to your bank, cyber.gov.au and Scamwatch.<\/p>\n
In addition to this, ASIC advises that consumers should always check to see if an investment opportunity is accompanied by a verified Australian Financial Services Licence.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"The number of Aussies being lured into scams by hard-to-spot AI-created videos is increasing at an alarming 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