One of Australia’s Big Four banks published efforts to battle crypto fraud activities aimed at degrading losses from scams.

Westpac, one of Australia’s ’ Big Four ’ banks, is introducing its initial trial of scam protection measures designed to combat fraudulent activities related to cryptocurrencies.

The protection measures are set to mitigate losses from scams and degrade potential threats.

According to the announcement, investment scams account for approximately 50% of all customer losses linked to scams, while around one-third of all scams involve direct transfers to cryptocurrency exchanges, making them extremely difficult to trace.

The Westpac ban comes on an equal day customers were reported they could no longer use PayID to transfer Australian dollars to their accounts. Told a “third-party provider ” that had placed restrictions on the exchange, affecting bank transfer withdrawals for now. 

According to Scott Collary — Westpac’s group executive of customer services and technology — while digital exchanges have a legitimate role in the financial ecosystem, the upgrade of digital currency has raised scammers using overseas exchanges.

Westpac plans to gradually present a phased trial of the new crypto payment protection blocks in late May. This trial is presented alongside different recent enterprises like Westpac Verify. This feature notifies customers of potential account name mismatches when making payments to a new bank- state branch, and account number, or sending money to an account that Westpac has no previous transaction history.

Related: Can you recover stolen Bitcoin from crypto scams?

Consumer advocacy group Choice reports Australians have sustained losses exceeding $129 million due to cryptocurrency scams. In 2021 solely, the Australian Consumer and Competition Commission received over 12,000 reports related to similar scams.

Crypto investment scams exhibit warning signs similar to deceptive social media ads, fraudulent websites, forged documents, and the usage of spoofing software.

Also, scammers may possess undisclosed personal data or attempt to manipulate targets into taking action during phone conversations.

(AMAKA NWAOKOCHA, Cointelegraph, 2023)