The number of scams affecting Western Australians appears to be on the rise, with government agencies looking to stamp out unscrupulous behaviour of scam operators.
The number of scams affecting Western Australians appears to be on the rise, with government agencies looking to stamp out unscrupulous behaviour of scam operators.
The WA Department of Consumer and Employment Protection has developed WA ScamNet to help combat the problem, and the department has also joined forces with other agencies across Australia to form the Australasian Consumer Fraud Taskforce.
One of the latest scams to hit WA is the Princess Diana scam, which tells people they have won a lottery paid from the estates of the late Princess of Wales. It says the money is held in a United States bank account and a transaction fee of $US2,800 is required to be paid to the US internal revenue service to release the funds.
With all the information available on scams it raises the question as to why the public remains susceptible to these crooked schemes.
University of Western Australia psychology lecturer Dr Nick Fay said there were several devices that could be used to get people to think and act in certain ways.
“These techniques are practiced by companies in product marketing as well as scam operators and focus on the positives by manipulating information,” he said.
“They manage people’s focus of attention.”
Specifically with scams, he said people may adopt a ‘lottery’ mentality and focus on the minute chance of winning something big instead of the improbability of doing so. “There is the ‘have to be in it to win in it’ approach and on that basis people may be prepared to lose a little for the prospect of winning big,” he said.
The scammers are nothing if not persistent. There are currently 156 scams registered on the WA ScamNet, and new schemes are appearing all the time.
WA Business News has received details of a credit card scam, where someone purporting to be from Visa or MasterCard contacts people saying they have detected fraudulent purchases on their credit card.
They confirm the person’s identity by asking for the last three digits on the back of the card, and once in possession of this information go ahead and make illegal purchases on the card.
WA Business News also reported recently on an advertising invoice scheme that sent fake invoices for advertisements that were to be placed in reputable publications. Companies caught in this sting naively paid the accounts for advertisements that never actually existed.
Fraudulent business practices are prevalent in many areas of business. In the financial services industry, the Financial Planning Association has issued an advice that anyone engaging a financial adviser should firstly check they are licensed or registered by a peak body.
The Australian Securities and Investments Commission has launched an e-newsletter to provide investors with information about fraudulent practitioners and dodgy schemes.
