Which? warns against growing threat of scammers
Consumer awareness brand Which? has warned vulnerable Brits to be aware of the rising threat of financial fraudsters.
This comes after the Financial Ombudsman Service reported that investment scam complaints saw the biggest increase this quarter.
Rocio Concha, director of policy and advocacy at Which? called on the government to pass the Online Safety Bill as a matter of priority in order to protect vulnerable consumers from scammers.
“Fraudsters are constantly refining their tactics in order to trick us into sending them money – and will often use events, like the cost of living crisis, to help them,” said Concha.
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“With millions of consumers seeing their budgets squeezed by rising prices, and with currently no savings account matching the rate of inflation, many will turn to alternative means in order to gain better returns on investment. Unfortunately, that often means falling into the hands of scammers, who are able to flood social media with paid-for advertising to promote bogus investment scams promising high returns.
“To protect consumers, the government must pass the Online Safety Bill which will give tech giants the responsibility to prevent fake and fraudulent content, promoted via paid-for advertising, from appearing on their sites.”
The Online Safety Bill would force social media sites and search engines to stamp out fraudulent paid-for adverts.
Until it passes into law, Which? has urged consumers to be wary of anyone asking for their personal details, and to question any deal which sounds like it might be too good to be true. The firm also told people to be aware of any spelling or grammatical mistakes that may indicate that a company is not legitimate.
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