ASIC Took Down 3,106 Crypto Scams in FY26 as AI Deepfakes Drove a 182% Surge

The Australian Securities and Investments Commission shuttered more than 19,400 online scams over the past financial year, a 182% jump from FY25. Cryptocurrency investment platforms made up the biggest single category: 3,106 sites, up nearly 30% from the prior period.

Sophisticated syndicates are now building whole fake ecosystems around a single crypto pitch, the regulator said in a news release Aug. 17. Social media ads for high-yield trading bots lead to a page that looks real. Deepfake videos of Prime Minister Anthony Albanese or financial commentator Alan Kohler push the same platform. Fabricated news articles and spoofed media websites praise it. AI-generated reviews and comments create the illusion of social proof. Victims are shown a small initial return on a fake dashboard to build trust before being pressured into a large deposit.

Once the money or crypto moves, it goes to overseas criminal syndicates and is gone.

ASIC Chair Sarah Court said the speed of generative AI has made these scams much harder for consumers to spot. "A simple online search is not enough to verify whether an opportunity is legitimate," Court said. "The presence of polished content, familiar branding or convincing testimonials does not mean an investment is legitimate."

The National Anti-Scam Centre tracked $7.4 million in reported losses from impersonation scams alone. The most hijacked names were Albanese, Kohler, and fellow financial commentator Tom Piotrowski.

Fraudsters also steal or fabricate Australian Financial Services Licence details to dress up their fake platforms, ASIC said. A consumer who searches the licence number might find a real company, but the scam website is unrelated.

ASIC and Scamwatch are pushing a simple verification chain: check the Professional Registers on ASIC's site to confirm the entity behind the platform holds a licence to offer financial services in Australia. Then check the Moneysmart Investor Alert List to see if the domain or company name has already been flagged. The regulator stressed that none of this costs money. Scammers sometimes charge a "verification fee" – that itself is a red flag.

Over the past three years ASIC has taken down more than 33,400 malicious links, fake platforms and social media ads. But the agency's enforcement reach stops at the border. Many of these syndicates operate from jurisdictions where Australian law does not apply, which is why the regulator keeps returning to the same message: prevention is the only reliable defense.

Court said the sheer volume of new scams means ASIC can never catch them all. "The best protection is a consumer who pauses before sending money," she said.

ASIC's FY26 takedown numbers include phishing sites, fake investment platforms and social media ads. The crypto segment alone – 3,106 sites – represents a 30% increase from FY25, when the regulator removed about 2,390 crypto-related scam pages. The overall surge of 182% reflects the scale of the problem, not a change in ASIC's enforcement capacity, the agency said.

Transnational criminal networks are now building what police describe as end-to-end fake ecosystems. The victim never leaves the scammer's controlled environment. Search results, reviews, license records, and news articles can all be fabricated. A real example from the ASIC release: scammers created a deepfake video of Albanese endorsing a "quantum AI trading bot" that promised 200% returns in 48 hours. The bot did not exist. The victims' funds went to wallets controlled by a syndicate in Southeast Asia.

Australian police are coordinating with international agencies on several active investigations, but the pace of new scam creation outstrips the rate of prosecution. ASIC said it is working with domain registrars and social media platforms to take down fraudulent content faster, but the syndicates simply spin up new sites under different names.

For consumers, the practical takeaway from ASIC's data is straightforward: any unsolicited investment offer is likely a scam. The regulator's recommended steps are to withhold funds and personal data, verify the licence on the Professional Registers, and check the Moneysmart list. If the entity is not listed, it is not licensed. If it is not licensed, the money should not move.

Court said the financial advice industry and the media have a role in repeating this message. "We need people to hear it enough times that it becomes a reflex," she said. "Stop. Verify. If it seems too good to be true, it is a scam."