Navigating the web of deceit
Social media, email, e-commerce platforms, phone calls: sometimes it seems like scams are everywhere. Is there anything we can do about it? Let’s take a Deep Dive.
💸 The scam market is huge and it’s growing.
🔍 Scams come in many forms and every new technology creates a new scamming opportunity.
🤑 It’s hard to fight against because it’s so lucrative. For many people, scamming is the best employment option they’ve got, while others have more complicated motivations. Some don’t have a choice.
QUOTABLE
“It’s morally wrong to allow a sucker to keep his money.” - WC Fields, actor and comedian
BY THE NUMBERS
77% 77 percent of scams take place on social media, online marketplaces and dating apps.
120,000 More than 120,000 people in Myanmar and 100,000 in Cambodia have been trafficked to work in scam factories.
$12.5 billion Scammers operating in an unnamed Southeast Asian country make between $7.5 billion and $12.5 billion a year, or about half of that country’s official GDP, according to a 2023 UN report.
QUIZ
How much is online payment fraud expected to be worth in 2023?
A. $8 billion
B. $48 billion
C. $88 billion
Scroll to the bottom for the answer.
DID YOU KNOW?
Western nations are the most targeted in online scams, but the country with the fourth-most victims, behind the US, the UK and Canada, is one sometimes more associated with scam perpetrators: India.
THE EDIT
🤥 Honest origins. How India’s giant scam industry grew out of its legitimate call centre business.
🚨 How to fight back. Here’s a neat distillation of the main types of scams you’re likely to come across and how to avoid falling victim to them
✋ Who else is fighting back? This is what’s happening at a technological and regulatory level to combat scamming.
👮 Thailand’s fighting Facebook. The Southeast Asian nation has threatened to shut the social media platform down locally over scamming concerns.
WATCH
Jemma Wei of Singaporean media company clicknetwork.tv tests out just how easy it is to scam her own family and friends.
THE FULL PICTURE
Romance scams are a particularly pernicious form of online fraud, breaking victims’ hearts as well as emptying their bank accounts. Here are the scammers’ favourite lies.
KEY PLAYER
Jim Browning
The rise of online scammers has also resulted in the rise of scam baiters, online vigilantes who turn the tables on criminals. Jim Browning, the pseudonym of a British software engineer, is a bit different from most. He focuses on serious investigation rather than making the scammers suffer entertaining consequences. His revenge on them can still be deeply satisfying though.
HONOUREE TO KNOW
Benjamin Mah
Benjamin Mah has shrewdly armed himself with a business that is desperately needed in this digital age. His brainchild, V-Key, which he co-founded and was previously CEO, specialises in mobile security solutions that are offered to at least 30 million users through its regional bank clients and its new partner Ant Financial Services Group, an affiliate of China’s e-commerce giant Alibaba Group. Currently, Benjamin's main role is being the regional director for digital transformation and innovation at Oracle in Asia-Pacific and Japan.
LISTEN
Anyone can become a victim of an online scam. But despite that, victims are often harshly judged.
ONE FINAL THING
You might think online scamming is a big problem now, but just wait till AI gets involved.
