Meta, Match, Coinbase and other tech giants have come together to fight online fraud and crypto scams
Because hosting frauds on your platform is detrimental to your company’s reputation, a coalition of major technology companies (including Match Group, Meta, Coinbase, and others) is forming on Tuesday to combat online fraud across dating apps, social media, and cryptocurrencies.
The newly formed coalition, Tech Against Scams, will collaborate to devise strategies for countering the tools utilized by con artists and to increase public awareness regarding financial fraud.
Before television series such as “The Tinder Swindler,” romance schemes have incurred substantial financial losses for victims.
As of 2019, the U.S. Federal Trade Commission reports that this manifestation of consumer deception inflicted the most significant financial loss upon its victims.
Likewise, social media fraud is a concern: Social media fraud cost American consumers $770 million in 2021, an increase of 18 times over 2017.
The FTC also reported that investment fraud caused consumer losses of over $3.8 billion in 2021, more than double the amount lost in 2021.
Additionally, there is the infamous cryptocurrency industry, which is so replete with fraud that company founders and other prominent figures in the sector are going to prison for grift, hacking, money laundering, and other offenses.
An entire blog was established to maintain track of the most recent developments in this field.
While this fraudulent activity occurs on the platforms rather than being perpetrated by the platforms themselves (except cryptocurrency), permitting it to flourish can damage the reputation of technology companies.
Moreover, many scams transcend platforms; for instance, a user may be led to a cryptocurrency exchange by a dating app fraud. As a result, there is a greater need for improved inter-business data sharing to combat the issue.
In addition to Match, Coinbase, and Meta (the parent company of Tinder, Hinge, and others), Kraken, Ripple, and Gemini have joined the crypto space.
The firms collectively intend to defend their users from romance scams and other forms of fraud, including the cryptocurrency fraud called “pig butchering.”
The latter is a persistent investment deception scheme in which the target is duped into investing in cryptocurrencies.
Scammers frequently target users of social media applications, establishing friendships or trust through communication before swiping their funds.
Also becoming more challenging to distinguish from real-life interactions is the increasing complexity of AI.
Last year, Yahoo Finance reported that fraudsters are employing artificial intelligence to generate “persuasive FaceTime calls, phone calls, and emails” to their targets, in which they may impersonate family members, potential romantic partners, friends, or even IRS agents.
Yoel Roth, VP of Trust & Safety at Match Group and formerly of Twitter, stated,
“Tech companies across industries collaborating is essential in preventing criminal activities and ultimately helps online platforms stay ahead, develop effective solutions, and address various types of financial crimes.”
“Along with our objective of enhancing the difficulty for fraudulent activities among online users, we remain committed to allocating resources towards the development of functionalities that impede fraudulent activities and eliminate unscrupulous individuals from our platform before causing damage.”
Guy Rosen, chief security officer of Meta, further stated that organizations must collaborate to address this issue holistically. “Because scammers and the organized criminal organizations responsible for pig butchering schemes target users across numerous internet services, it is difficult for a single organization to see the big picture of malicious activity; they rely on each of us to operate in isolation,” he explained.
The organizations will exchange information and helpful hints to safeguard users against fraudulent activities on their platforms.
Together, they will devise strategies to protect and inform consumers about the constantly evolving array of financial frauds that plague the market.
In addition, when required, the coalition members will continue collaborating with law enforcement to aid their investigations by disclosing details regarding online fraud and criminal activities on their platforms.