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Fraud Awareness Week 2008
3 - 10 March
Fraud Awareness
Week 2008 resources
International context
New Zealand Co-ordination
Fraud Awareness Week Action
Australasian Consumer Fraud
Taskforce (ACFT) 2008 scams survey
Commerce
Commission
International Consumer Protection and Enforcement
Network
Australasian Consumer Fraud Taskforce (ACFT)
ACFT 2008 scams survey
Australasian Consumer Fraud Taskforce
2007 survey results
Fraud Awareness Week 2008 aimed to raise New
Zealander’s awareness about how they could spot scams,
protect themselves from scams, and
report a scam
to help protect others.
Fraud Awareness Week 2008 focused on scams that
seduce consumers with promises of easy money, great
prizes or true love and deceive or trick consumers into
giving scammers their personal details.
The key messages for Fraud Awareness Week 2008 are
very simple:
- Scams target you. Protect yourself.
- Don’t be seduced. Don’t be deceived.
- Fight the scammers! Don't respond!
- If it looks to good to be true, it probably is.
- Go to SCAMwatch for
further information.
You can get further key information from the Fraud
Awareness Week 2008 resources.
Most scams originate from outside New Zealand and
once money is sent overseas it is virtually impossible
to recover.
But New Zealanders can fight scammers,
simply by not responding to a scam attempt.
By
responding you let the scammer know you are there. If
you don’t respond they don’t know you exist and they
can’t take your money.
International context
Scams continue to be a problem worldwide, with New
Zealand and overseas research showing that consumers are
still being targeted and too many are still being taken
in. Educating consumers about how to avoid scams when
they are targeted is considered a key scamming
prevention strategy both in New Zealand and overseas.
In 2008, Fraud Awareness Initiatives are still a
global effort of the
International Consumer Protection and Enforcement
Network.
In Australia and New Zealand, initiatives
are run under the umbrella of the
Australasian Consumer Fraud Taskforce (ACFT). In
2008, the ACFT is made up of 19 trans-Tasman government
regulatory agencies and departments.
New Zealand Co-ordination
The
Ministry of Consumer Affairs and the
Commerce
Commission are members of the ACFT and coordinate the
New Zealand initiative, with a number of other
organisations that undertake their own action in
parallel.
Organisations undertaking parallel action during
Fraud Awareness Week 2008 include:
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Banking Ombudsman
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Department of Internal Affairs
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Inland Revenue Department
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Ministry of Economic Development
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New Zealand Bankers Association
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New Zealand Police
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Netsafe
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Privacy Commissioner
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Securities Commission
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Serious Fraud Office
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Symantec
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Telecom
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Telstra Clear
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TradeMe
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Visa New Zealand
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Vodafone New Zealand
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Western Union
Fraud Awareness Week Action
During Fraud Awareness Week 2008, the Ministry of
Consumer Affairs launched the new improved SCAMwatch
site which provided new, up to date information, a scam alerts section,
new
examples of scams and an
improved, simpler
scam reporting function.
Media activity was focussed on raising awareness of
scams, reminding people not to respond to them, and
directing people to SCAMwatch for more information and
to report scams.
This core activity was supported by the
action undertaken within and by organisations that were
working in parallel on fraud awareness during Fraud
Awareness Week.
The Australasian Consumer Fraud Taskforce is again
running a survey to find out about any scams that
consumers have received and how they have responded to
them. Gathering this information will help to improve
the detection and prevention of scams.
Consumers can fill out the
Australasian Consumer Fraud Taskforce 2008 scams survey on the Australian Institute
of Criminology website.
Results of the
Australasian Consumer Fraud Taskforce 2007 survey are
now available.
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