Scammers are getting more and more sophisticated as the Australian watchdog today (Thursday) revealed that fake financial services websites are displaying warning signs to bait potential victims.

An Increase in Fake Websites

According to the Australian Securities and Investments Commission (ASIC), the fraudulent websites display fake warning banners that “usually contain a phone number which consumers are encouraged to call to check that they are dealing with the genuine company; however, the phone number leads consumers to the scammers instead.”

Further, these fake websites even encourage potential victims to report scams to police, ASIC, and Scamwatch. With these tactics, scammers try to gain the trust of the potential victims.

“Increasingly, scammers steal the details of real Australian companies when they register their websites. This means the details of the real registered company appear on the fake website in the registrant details,” the Aussie regulator stated.

Along with the warning signs, scammers also run paid promotional content on popular websites. ASIC found an increase in such fake news articles that “often leads back to imposter websites.”

Regulators Fighting Scammers

Meanwhile, ASIC is strengthening its efforts to fight fake websites and implemented a capability to take down scam websites last year. According to the official figures, the regulator took down nearly 3,500 fraudulent investment websites since July 2023.

ASIC is not the only regulator alarmed by scammers' rampant impersonation of legitimate financial services firms. The Cyprus Securities and Exchange Commission even issued multiple warnings against scammers impersonating its websites and even officials.

In an effort to tackle such scams, regulators in Cyprus, Italy, the United Kingdom, Spain, and others are regularly publishing lists of fraudulent websites and clones of legitimate websites to warn the public. The Italian regulator even has the additional authority to block access to such websites at a domain level.