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A Victorian woman lost AUD $13,000 after speaking to a fraudster posing as a bank employee. A cybercrime specialist said the case reflects a broader rise in scam losses across Australia.
Teagan said she was on a family holiday when she received a call from someone claiming to be from her bank's fraud team. The caller said there had been three suspicious transactions and appeared credible because he knew her name, date of birth, mobile number, home address and email address.
She said he urged her to act quickly to stop further unauthorised activity. He instructed her to provide a security code sent to her phone and send a photo of her driving licence as proof of identity.
She later received a call from Bendigo Bank asking whether she had made multiple gift card purchases at Australia Post. After she said she had already spoken to someone from the fraud team, the bank told her she had in fact been dealing with a scammer.
By that point, Teagan said AUD $13,000 had been taken from her account in four transactions. She reported the matter to police and disputed the payments with the bank.
She said the bank offered her an AUD $5,000 goodwill payment. She initially declined while trying to recover the full amount, but later accepted and said she has not recovered financially from the loss.
Growing losses
Scam losses remain high nationwide. Figures from the National Anti-Scam Centre show Australians lost AUD $2.18 billion to scams over the past year.
Richard Mallam, Founder and Chief Executive Officer of VO, said the methods used against consumers were becoming more advanced as criminals combined personal data from breaches with artificial intelligence tools.
"A cybercrime is now reported in Australia every six minutes, and the average cost to an individual victim has risen to $33,000. The financial, health and energy sectors are the most susceptible to cyber attacks," said Richard Mallam, Founder and Chief Executive Officer of VO.
He said fraud attempts against banks and other financial institutions were increasing in both volume and sophistication. Hackers, he said, were using AI tools to mimic identities and exploit existing verification systems.
"We are not only seeing a rapid increase in the volume of scams, but also in their sophistication thanks to AI, including the ability to re-create a person's ID, effectively making a digital twin to then sign up to different services, operating on that person's behalf from leasing vehicles to taking out loans and credit cards," said Mallam.
Mallam said banks and superannuation funds were facing persistent attacks aimed at taking control of customer accounts. He argued that access to a small amount of personal information can be enough for criminals to pass common checks.
"Financial institutions like banks, as well as super funds, are receiving thousands of fraudulent calls every week from hackers using AI bots to try to take over customers' bank accounts.
"All they need is a few seconds of your voice, your bank details and access to your phone or email to complete the bank's verification, and they are in. It's such an outdated system and consumers are powerless," said Mallam.
Identity checks
Mallam said stronger identity verification systems were available but had not been widely adopted. He pointed to verifiable credential technology as a way to reduce impersonation and account takeover risks.
"This is far more advanced than two-factor text messages or entering a PIN or code because a hacker can't penetrate this. It's like a digital handshake that authenticates your identity from verified documents," said Mallam.
He said such systems could use documents including passports, birth certificates and digital driving licences to confirm a customer's identity. In his view, this would reduce reliance on text messages, one-time codes and other checks that can be intercepted or manipulated.
"A verifiable credential like this will shut down impersonation and deepfake fraud, and put real trust behind a validated passkey to close that gap," said Mallam.
Teagan's account highlights how scams can unfold through a mix of personal data, urgency and trust in familiar institutions. It also underlines the gap between the financial losses consumers can face and the partial reimbursement they may receive when disputes are raised.