Scam losses in Australia 2014 to 2025: data and trends

Published 11 Nov 2026

Reported scam losses: $2.18 billion¹; 2025, five reporting organisations
Losses reported to Scamwatch: $81.8 million → $334.8 million²¹; 2014 to 2025, one reporting channel
Investment scam losses: $837.7 million¹; 2025, 38% of reported losses
Card fraud victimisation rate: 5.9% → 10.4%³; People aged 15 and over, 2014-15 to 2024-25

Scam losses in AustraliaReported scam losses were $2.18 billion in 2025. The scam losses article covers the latest year's losses in more detail, including the scam types with the highest reported losses.

Investment scam lossesInvestment scams have had the highest reported losses in every year from 2020 to 2025. The investment scam article covers how much is lost and to which schemes.

Card fraud in AustraliaThe ABS card fraud victimisation rate rose from 5.9% in 2014-15 to 10.4% in 2024-25. The card fraud article covers how many people are affected and how much is lost.

Section 01 · Losses by year

How have reported scam losses in Australia changed since 2014?

Reported scam losses in Australia rose from $2.03 billion in 2024 to $2.18 billion in 2025, according to the National Anti-Scam Centre's Targeting Scams 2025 report¹. The 2025 total includes losses reported to Scamwatch, ReportCyber, the Australian Financial Crimes Exchange (AFCX), IDCARE and the Australian Securities and Investments Commission (ASIC), with duplicate reports removed.

The highest total was recorded in 2022, at $3.15 billion⁴. Reported scam losses then fell to $2.74 billion in 2023⁵.

The organisations contributing to these totals changed over time. The 2015 total of $229 million included Scamwatch, the Australian Cybercrime Online Reporting Network (ACORN) and scam-disruption programs⁶. The 2018 total of $489.7 million included Scamwatch, ACORN and other government agencies, with ACORN losses for the second half of the year estimated using figures from the first six months⁷.

The 2019 total of $634 million included losses reported to the big four banks for the first time⁸. The 2022 total added IDCARE and the AFCX and was not adjusted to remove duplicate reports⁴.

The ACCC estimated scam losses at more than $2 billion in 2021, including an allowance for unreported losses⁹. Reported losses alone totalled $1.76 billion. The ACCC and the National Anti-Scam Centre later rounded the 2021 total to $1.8 billion¹.

Losses reported to Scamwatch alone rose from $81.8 million in 2014 to $569.5 million in 2022²⁴. They then fell to $318.8 million in 2024 before rising to $334.8 million in 2025¹.

How much were reported scam losses in Australia each year from 2015 to 2025? — Each column is the total published in that year's report. 2015 is the first year a total across several organisations was published; the 2014 report used ACCC data only. The 2016 value is the ACCC's published figure of almost $300 million, and 2021, 2022, 2024 and 2025 are published to the nearest $10 million. The 2022 total was not adjusted for reports made to more than one organisation.

Each row is taken from that year's report. Other government agencies include the Australian Taxation Office (ATO), Services Australia, WA ScamNet and the Australian Communications and Media Authority (ACMA) in the years the reports name them. The 2023 report removed one 2022 outlier from its comparison, giving 2022 Scamwatch losses of $507.9 million on that basis.
Reported scam losses and the organisations included, Australia, 2014 to 2025
Year	Reported losses ($ million)	Organisations included	Scamwatch ($ million)
2014	Not published	ACCC (Scamwatch) only	81.8²
2015	229⁶	Scamwatch, ACORN and scam-disruption programs	84.9⁶
2016	300¹⁰	Scamwatch, ACORN and scam-disruption programs	83.6¹⁰
2017	340¹¹	Scamwatch, ACORN and other government agencies	90.9¹¹
2018	489.7⁷	Scamwatch, ACORN and other government agencies	107.0⁷
2019	634⁸	Scamwatch, ACORN, ReportCyber, other government agencies and the big four banks	142.9⁸
2020	851.4¹²	Scamwatch, ReportCyber, ASIC, other government agencies and 10 banks and money remitters	175.7¹²
2021	1,760⁹	Scamwatch, ReportCyber, ASIC, other government agencies and 12 banks and money remitters	323.7⁹
2022	3,150⁴	Scamwatch, ReportCyber, AFCX, IDCARE, ASIC and other government agencies	569.5⁴
2023	2,741.9⁵	Scamwatch, ReportCyber, AFCX, IDCARE and ASIC	476.8⁵
2024	2,030¹³	Scamwatch, ReportCyber, AFCX, IDCARE and ASIC	318.8¹³
2025	2,180¹	Scamwatch, ReportCyber, AFCX, IDCARE and ASIC	334.8¹

Source · ACCC and National Anti-Scam Centre, Targeting scams reports, 2014 to 2025 editions.

Section 02 · Scam types

Which scam types have caused the largest reported losses in Australia since 2014?

Investment scams had the highest reported losses in Australia in 2025, at $837.7 million, followed by payment redirection scams at $166.8 million and romance scams at $139.9 million¹. The five scam types with the highest losses accounted for 60% of reported losses in 2025.

Dating and romance scams recorded the highest losses reported to the ACCC in 2014, at $27.9 million, or 34% of Scamwatch losses². Investment scams overtook romance scams in 2015 with Scamwatch losses of $24.4 million compared with $22.7 million⁶. Romance scams were back on top in 2016, at $25.5 million compared with $23.6 million for investment schemes¹⁰.

Investment scams have recorded the highest Scamwatch losses of any scam type in each year since 2017¹¹¹. Losses reported to Scamwatch from investment scams fell from $377.2 million in 2022 to $172.2 million in 2025⁴.

Business email compromise scams had the highest combined reported losses of any scam type in 2019, at $132 million, compared with $126 million for investment scams⁸. Investment scams have had the highest reported losses every year from 2020 to 2025¹³⁵⁴⁹¹¹².

Reported investment scam losses rose from $328 million in 2020¹² to $701 million in 2021, partly because of cryptocurrency investment scams, according to the ACCC⁹. The 2020 figure included only two weeks of ReportCyber investment scam data¹². Losses then reached $1.5 billion in 2022, before falling to $1.3 billion in 2023 and $945.0 million in 2024⁴⁵¹³.

How have investment and romance scam losses reported to Scamwatch changed since 2014? — The figures cover losses reported to Scamwatch, one reporting channel, in every year. The ACCC called the investment category investment schemes from 2014 to 2016, and dating and romance scams are shown as romance scams.

Which scam types had the highest reported losses in Australia in 2025? — The five types made up 60% of the $2.18 billion of reported losses in 2025.

The investment scam losses article covers the schemes behind these losses in more detail.

Section 03 · Contact methods

How have scam contact methods in Australia changed since 2015?

Text messages overtook phone calls as the most common scam contact method reported to Scamwatch in 2022, with 79,835 text message reports compared with 63,821 phone reports⁴. Before this, phone calls had been the most common contact method reported to the ACCC since 2011⁸.

Phone reports reached 144,603 in 2021, accounting for 50% of all Scamwatch reports⁹. They then fell 55.9%, from 144,603 in 2021 to 63,821 in 2022⁴. According to the ACCC, the decline coincided with the introduction of the Reducing Scam Calls and SMS Code, which requires telecommunications providers to monitor and block scam calls.

Text message reports rose from 3,985 in 2015 to 109,621 in 2023¹⁰⁵. They had reached 67,180 in 2021⁹. Scamwatch received 26,496 reports of FluBot scam text messages, which tricked recipients into downloading malicious software onto their phones, between 2 August and 31 December 2021. Text message reports then fell by 62.4% from 77,365 in 2024 to 29,058 in 2025¹.

Email became the most commonly reported contact method in 2024 and remained so in 2025, at 90,819 and 84,861 reports, respectively¹³¹.

Phone calls had the highest Scamwatch losses of any contact method in 2024, at $107.2 million¹³. Losses linked to social media rose from $9.5 million in 2016 to $93.5 million in 2023, before falling to $69.5 million in 2024¹⁰⁵¹³.

In 2025, online contact, including websites, mobile apps and social media, accounted for the highest Scamwatch losses of any contact method, at $158.5 million, compared with $72.5 million for phone calls¹.

How many scam reports to Scamwatch named phone, text message or email contact from 2015 to 2025? — The 2024 and 2025 reports publish the number of phone reports with a loss but not the total number of phone reports, so the phone line ends in 2023. 2015 is taken from the 2016 report, and every other year from that year's report.

Social media is the reports' social networking and online forums category.
Losses reported to Scamwatch by contact method, Australia, 2017 to 2024
Contact method	2017 ($ million)	2020 ($ million)	2023 ($ million)	2024 ($ million)
Phone call	29.2¹¹	48.2¹²	116.0⁵	107.2¹³
Social media	15.8¹¹	27.1¹²	93.5⁵	69.5¹³
Email	17.5¹¹	35.2¹²	80.0⁵	47.6¹³
Text message	1.7¹¹	3.1¹²	26.9⁵	14.0¹³

Source · ACCC and National Anti-Scam Centre, Targeting scams 2017, 2020, 2023 and 2024.

Section 04 · Pandemic years

How did scam reports and losses in Australia change during the COVID-19 pandemic?

Scam reports to Scamwatch rose by 29%, from 167,797 in 2019 to 216,087 in 2020, while losses rose by 23% to $175.7 million¹². In 2021, reports rose by a further 33% to 286,622, while reported losses increased by 84% to $323.7 million⁹.

Scamwatch received more than 5,400 reports that directly mentioned COVID-19 between February and December 2020, with more than $6 million in reported losses¹². Reports mentioning COVID-19 then fell to 4,283 in 2021, although losses from these reports rose to $8.6 million⁹.

Phishing reports rose by 75% to about 44,000 in 2020, partly because of a rise in government impersonation scams during the pandemic, according to the ACCC¹².

Combined reported scam losses rose from $851.4 million in 2020¹² to $1.76 billion in 2021⁹. The 2021 total included data from 12 banks and money remitters, compared with 10 in 2020¹²⁹.

The data does not show how much of the increase was due to the pandemic.

An estimated 3.6% of people aged 15 and over responded to a scam in 2020-21, compared with 2.4% in 2014-15, according to ABS Personal Fraud data¹⁴. An estimated 2.1% of people, or 431,100, were exposed to at least one scam they believed was related to COVID-19. The scam victimisation rate fell to 2.7% in 2021-22¹⁵.

Section 05 · ABS surveys

How have personal fraud rates in Australia changed since 2007?

An estimated 10.4% of people aged 15 and over in Australia, or 2.3 million people, experienced card fraud in 2024-25, up from 5.9% in 2014-15, according to ABS Personal Fraud data³. The card fraud victimisation rate rose in each survey year from 2014-15 to 2023-24, reaching 9.9% in 2023-24, and was largely unchanged in 2024-25¹⁶³.

The share of Australians who experienced card fraud was 2.4% in 2007, when the first national survey was conducted, and 3.7% in 2010-11¹⁷¹⁸.

Card fraud victims had $2.2 billion taken or spent through fraud in their most recent incident in 2024-25³. After reimbursements, their net loss was $350 million.

An estimated 2.7% of Australians aged 15 and over experienced a scam in 2024-25, equivalent to 596,600 people³. This was down from 3.1% in 2023-24 and similar to 2.4% in 2014-15. The scam rate ranged from 2.0% in 2007 to 3.6% in 2020-21¹⁷¹⁴. Meanwhile, the share of Australians who experienced identity theft was 1.0% in 2024-25, up from 0.7% in 2014-15³.

The share of people experiencing any personal fraud rose from 5.0% in 2007 to 8.5% in 2014-15 and 11% in 2020-21¹⁷¹⁹¹⁴. It reached 13.1% in 2024-25, or 15% including online impersonation, which the ABS began measuring in 2021-22³.

What share of people in Australia experienced card fraud or a scam in each ABS survey from 2007 to 2024-25? — The ABS ran no survey between 2014-15 and 2020-21. The 2007 and 2010-11 card fraud figures cover credit or bank card fraud. A scam victim is a person who responded to a scam, and the ABS changed the wording of the scam question in 2022-23 and advises caution comparing scam results across that change.

The card fraud article covers card fraud victims and their losses in more detail.

Section 06 · Underreporting

An estimated 71% of people aged 15 and over who experienced a scam in 2024-25 (424,400 people) either notified an authority or were notified by one about the most serious incident³. This was unchanged from 2023-24¹⁶³.

The share of scam victims who reported a scam or were contacted by an authority was 57% in 2021-22 and 69% in 2022-23¹⁵²⁰.

A bank or other financial institution was the authority most often involved, accounting for 54% of scam victims in 2024-25, while 8.5% notified police³.

Almost 30% of people who experienced a scam in 2024-25 did not report it, according to the National Anti-Scam Centre¹. The centre estimates that many of those people lost little or no money, meaning actual losses would not necessarily be 30% higher than reported losses.

Scamwatch accounted for 39.2% of scam reports and 12.8% of losses across the five reporting organisations in 2025, before duplicate reports were removed¹. Of the reports Scamwatch received that year, 85.9% involved no financial loss.

An ACCC-commissioned Roy Morgan survey of 1,508 people in 2021 found that 30% of scam victims did not report to anyone, 13% reported to Scamwatch, 37% to a bank and 16% to police⁹. A 2019 survey for the ACCC found that around 33% of people who had lost money to scams in the previous five years did not report the loss to any organisation⁸.

In 2014-15, 36% of scam victims reported the incident to an agency¹⁹. In 2010-11, 31.2% of scam victims reported the incident to an agency¹⁸. These rates are not directly comparable with the figures above, as the ABS reporting series starts in 2020-21 and also counts people notified by an authority³.

The ABS estimated total losses from personal fraud at $3 billion in 2014-15, including $2.1 billion from card fraud¹⁹. The ABS has not published an estimate of total personal fraud losses since 2014-15, so its figures cannot be directly compared with recent reported scam losses³.

What share of scam victims in Australia notified an authority from 2020-21 to 2024-25? — The ABS advises caution comparing 2020-21 with later years because the 2020-21 question did not explicitly include cases where an authority notified the person. Authorities include banks and other financial institutions, police and government agencies.

Section 07 · Common questions

Scam and fraud losses: quick answers

How much money do people in Australia lose to scams each year?

Combined reported scam losses in Australia were $2.18 billion in 2025, according to the National Anti-Scam Centre, based on reports to Scamwatch, ReportCyber, the Australian Financial Crimes Exchange, IDCARE and ASIC. Losses reported to Scamwatch alone were $334.8 million in 2025.

What was the worst year for scam losses in Australia?

Reported scam losses were highest in 2022, at $3.15 billion, among the years from 2015 to 2025 for which the ACCC and the National Anti-Scam Centre publish a combined total. However, the 2022 total did not remove duplicate reports, and the organisations contributing data changed over time.

Which type of scam causes the biggest losses in Australia?

Investment scams had the highest reported losses in Australia in 2025, at $837.7 million, accounting for 38% of the $2.18 billion total. Investment scams have had the highest reported losses in every year from 2020 to 2025.

Are scam losses in Australia going down?

Combined reported scam losses fell from $3.15 billion in 2022 to $2.03 billion in 2024, then rose to $2.18 billion in 2025. Losses reported to Scamwatch fell from $569.5 million in 2022 to $318.8 million in 2024, then rose to $334.8 million in 2025.

How many scam victims in Australia report the scam?

An estimated 71% of people aged 15 years and over who experienced a scam in 2024-25 either contacted an authority or were contacted by one about the most serious incident, according to the ABS. The National Anti-Scam Centre estimates that almost 30% of people who experienced a scam in 2024-25 did not report it.

How common is card fraud in Australia?

An estimated 10.4% of people aged 15 years and over, or 2.3 million people, experienced card fraud in 2024-25, according to the ABS. This was up from 5.9% in 2014-15.

Methodology

Scam loss figures come from the ACCC and National Anti-Scam Centre's Targeting Scams reports for 2014 to 2025. Each year's combined reported losses are taken from that year's report. The organisations contributing data changed over time, so the annual totals are not directly comparable. The 2022 total includes duplicate reports, while the 2023 to 2025 totals have duplicates removed. Some earlier figures were also rounded in later reports.

Scamwatch losses, scam types and contact methods are taken from the same reports. Some categories changed over time, including the introduction of a broader online contact category in 2025. Scamwatch figures cover only reports made to that service, and most reports involve no financial loss.

Fraud rates come from the ABS Personal Fraud surveys, conducted in 2007, 2010-11, 2014-15 and annually from 2020-21. The surveys cover Australians aged 15 and over. Changes to survey questions affect some comparisons between years, particularly scam reporting figures. The ABS also publishes information on the statistical reliability of its estimates, which is not reproduced here.

Percentage changes, shares and differences are calculated from the published figures. Figures were checked against the original reports and publishers' websites in November 2026.

References

National Anti-Scam Centre, Targeting scams: report of the National Anti-Scam Centre on scams data and activity 2025 · nasc.gov.au ↑ b c d e f g h i j k l m n o p q
ACCC, Targeting scams: report of the ACCC on scam activity 2014 · nasc.gov.au ↑ b c d
Australian Bureau of Statistics, Personal fraud, 2024-25 financial year · Australian Bureau of Statistics ↑ b c d e f g h i j k l m
ACCC, Targeting scams: report of the ACCC on scams activity 2022 · nasc.gov.au ↑ b c d e f g h i j
National Anti-Scam Centre, Targeting scams: report on scams activity 2023 · nasc.gov.au ↑ b c d e f g h i j k l
ACCC, Targeting scams: report of the ACCC on scam activity 2015 · nasc.gov.au ↑ b c d
ACCC, Targeting scams: report of the ACCC on scam activity 2018 · nasc.gov.au ↑ b c
ACCC, Targeting scams 2019: a review of scam activity since 2009 · nasc.gov.au ↑ b c d e f
ACCC, Targeting scams: report of the ACCC on scams activity 2021 · nasc.gov.au ↑ b c d e f g h i j k l
ACCC, Targeting scams: report of the ACCC on scam activity 2016 · nasc.gov.au ↑ b c d e
ACCC, Targeting scams: report of the ACCC on scam activity 2017 · nasc.gov.au ↑ b c d e f g
ACCC, Targeting scams: report of the ACCC on scam activity 2020 · nasc.gov.au ↑ b c d e f g h i j k l m n
National Anti-Scam Centre, Targeting scams: report of the National Anti-Scam Centre on scams data and activity 2024 · nasc.gov.au ↑ b c d e f g h i j k
Australian Bureau of Statistics, Personal Fraud, 2020-21 · Australian Bureau of Statistics ↑ b c
Australian Bureau of Statistics, Personal Fraud, 2021-22 · Australian Bureau of Statistics ↑ b
Australian Bureau of Statistics, Personal fraud, 2023-24 financial year · Australian Bureau of Statistics ↑ b
Australian Bureau of Statistics, Personal Fraud, 2007 (cat. no. 4528.0), Summary of findings · Australian Bureau of Statistics ↑ b c
Australian Bureau of Statistics, Personal Fraud, 2010-11 (cat. no. 4528.0), Snapshot of personal fraud · Australian Bureau of Statistics ↑ b
Australian Bureau of Statistics, Personal Fraud, 2014-15 · Australian Bureau of Statistics ↑ b c
Australian Bureau of Statistics, Personal fraud, 2022-23 financial year · Australian Bureau of Statistics ↑