Martin Lewis and Elon Musk don't seem to have much in common. One is a trustworthy UK personal finance guru. The other is the wealthiest person in the world and an intimate ally of Donald Trump. However, their wisdom and wealth each becomes a powerful weapon for the con artist.
“I have the suspicious honour of being used in scam ads more than anyone else in the UK, despite never advertising,” Lewis tells the Guardian.
“When we add Elon Musk, we're the majority of fraudulent ads,” says the founder of Moneysavingexpert.com.
Lewis' position as a force for good means that people pay attention when he offers advice. As a result, he says, the con artist is using his influence with the public to send what is “the psychological message of shortcuts.” “I'm there to portray a 'reliable financial source.' Elon Musk has “huge wealth.” ”
This week, a parental investigation into a $35 million (£27 million) scam has highlighted the tactics investment scammers use to cheate Brits from millions of pounds each week.
The scam was exposed to Swedish public broadcaster SVT due to a massive leak of fraudulent call centre data, and shared files with international media partners. Of the roughly 2,000 victims, 652 people who persuaded them to give up the largest amount came from the UK.
So, can you avoid you, or your loved ones, join their ranks?
When it comes to investment scams, fake cryptocurrencies are at the top of the list, but scammers can be far too good to buy other things like gold, wine, real estate, carbon credits, land banks and more.
Latest data from the banking trade group UK Finance showed that investment scammers deceived Britons from £56 million in the first six months of 2024. However, since many victims do not report crimes, the true total is much higher.
These scams are usually a type of approved push payment (APP) scams, which involves tricking someone into sending money voluntarily from a bank account.
For victims, it often starts with clicking on (fake) social media ads or news alerts. This is usually probably a great crypto investment tip, but in reality it's a trick that only leads to scammers who are pretending to be real business.
Avid investors initially give a small amount of money, saying £250, before they know it – they're rich thanks to sophisticated software that appears to display live trading screens.
In these types of fraud, its “profit” is pure fiction and acts as bait. Victims usually lose a lot of money trying to cash out. “windfall” is always blocked by the need for another payment, whether it's a broker's fee or a tax bill. It will only be terminated when the victim breaks.
Along the way, the con artists are based on the idea that traditional banks and governments suspect codes and view them as a threat. This helps to convince the victim to mislead the bank about the true purpose of the transaction.
Meanwhile, cryptocurrency volatility and the perception that people can become wealthy overnight provide the best cover for scammers. As a result, the number of crypto frauds reported to the Financial Conduct Authority (FCA) has more than doubled since 2020, Financial Monitor said.
Faced with trying to combat this growing problem, the FCA has posted a list of “warning signs” of crypto fraud on its website. People recommend being “very careful” if any of the answers to the following questions are “yes.”
Have you heard from Blue?
Are you under pressure to invest quickly?
Are you promised investment returns that sound unrealistic?
Are they trying to flatten you?
If you want to do homework with your investment, start by checking whether the company or individual is permitted. Almost all financial services companies in the UK must be approved or registered by the FCA and will be registered in the Financial Services Register.
Another useful tool is WatchDog's Scamsmart Investment Checker.
You must ensure that your company's reference number and contact details match those in the register. If the list is not listed or if the company says it is outdated, please call the FCA on 0800 111 6768. Always use contact details on the Financial Services Register as contact details, as some companies pretend to be permitted.
Meanwhile, Lisa Webb, a consumer law expert, said: Sometimes, Deepfake videos are edits of images that already exist, so this is a good way to find the original and make sure that the ads you see are likely to be fraudulent. ”
And no matter what you do, don't do it You can download software or apps from sources you don't trust and someone can access your device. Doing this will allow scammers to control their devices and access their bank accounts.
The good news is that if you become a victim of an APP scam, you are likely to be able to retrieve the money from the payment company you used. This is because new rules came into effect in October that enforce banks to enforce refunds up to £85,000.
You also have the option to raise your case with the Financial Ombudsman Service (FOS), which has a £430,000 reward limit. This is a free service, and FOS sets up a process that consumers should follow on their website.
“Many of the cases we see today involve cryptocurrency,” says Pat Hurley, director of the ombudsman at FOS. He adds that the organization is also seeing an increase in the number of “multi-stage fraud” as many high street banks block crypto payments.
These are scams where scammers encourage people to move their money through various banks and other payment providers, making it easier for victims to buy crypto as part of fraudulent investments, Harley says.
He adds: Every day, we are the reality that it is often a scam. ”
Victims are often amazed by the hugely hit returns. Unfortunately, the returns offered by actual real-world investments typically result in less turbo charging. When the investment platform looked at the average annual revenue provided by Hargreaves Lansdown by comparable investments over 20 years, it turns out that UK stocks supply 7%, while for technological stocks, the figure is 16.4%. When I went to gold, my annual revenue was 11.2%.
“If your investments are shown and you say you can achieve a much higher return than these, ask yourself why,” says Victoria Hasler, head of foundation research at Hargreaves Lansdown.
“A higher return is usually compensation for more risk. For stocks, you should expect long-term returns of around 7-10% per year,” she says. “In the past few years, technology returns have been very high, skewing the long-term average for the sector, but we don't necessarily expect it to continue.”
And what about the code? Hustler is Stern: “Hargreaves Lansdown does not offer cryptocurrency and does not plan to do so. The FCA bans the sale of crypto derivatives to all retail investors due to the harm they bring. Speculation in cryptocurrency is very high risk and should not be confused with investment.”
She adds: “Celebrity support is not a good indicator because it can be easily fake. Even if they are real, we don't guarantee that the people they support have certain investment knowledge.”
Many of the victims of the fraud The Guardian spoke about have lost life-changing money, a situation Lewis describes as “bloody and terrible.”
“I have heard stories of people and self-esteem who have lost their lives savings because of these criminals.
Meanwhile, Lewis is dull with his advice. “What I can say in the general public is that if you see a celebrity ads on social media (or definitely ads), you need to assume it's a scam, from the point of being directly backed up by a trusted source.”
