Cybersecurity specialists have welcomed a new trial by the Australian Competition and Consumer Commission (ACCC) to automatically take down scam websites. The trial saw dozens of scam sites, including crypto scams, knocked offline after more than 300 were reported.
The ACCC reported that Australians had lost $113 million in cryptocurrency scams last year. The new trial will be in partnership with the Australian Securities and Investment Commission (ASIC) and will focus on efficiently removing scam websites once they have been reported to Australian regulators, to protect potential investors from falling victim to crypto fraud.
The ACCC is using a countermeasures service from the UK-based Netcraft, which has been providing a similar service for the past four years to the UK’s National Cyber Security Centre.
According to an IT News report, sites already taken down include “phishing sites impersonating Australian businesses and government authorities,” along with “puppy scams, shoe scams, cryptocurrency investment scams and tech support scams”.
Ken Gamble, Executive Chairman of private intelligence firm IFW Global, praised the development. He told Cointelegraph this is “the best news he has heard” as he had “seen the damage these sites made by sophisticated fraudsters have done using state of the art digital marketing techniques.”
“These crypto scam websites are unregulated, organized by criminal groups, many residing in Eastern Europe, who operate call centers, taking millions from mums and dads across the world every day.”
Gamble said that Australian government agencies also need to be open to collaborating with the private sector to see real success.
“We need law enforcement involved and collaborate with different countries […] many of these major cryptocurrency exchanges aren’t helpful with fraud investigations, making our investigations a lot harder than necessary”.
Researchers and romantics beware
Gamble said that individuals researching cryptocurrency are often targeted with Facebook advertisements “luring them in” with “Hollywood style professional videos” convincing them how easy it is to make money.
“If somebody is wanting to invest $10,000 into cryptocurrency, they should spend $1,000 doing due diligence checks to ensure it is a legitimate platform […] if it turns out to be a scam, it will be the best $1,000 they will have ever spent.”
He said those investing in cryptocurrency should do their own due diligence as…
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