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5 hours ago
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The amount of money lost to investment scams by UK consumers has leapt 55% in a year as cryptocurrency fraudsters intensify their efforts to cheat people out of their savings, data shows.
Official UK banking industry data shows that while the total amount stolen by fraudsters increased 3% to £629m in the first six months of this year compared with last year, investment scam losses surged, reaching £97.7m during the period – more than £500,000 a day.
With these scams, criminals trick their victims into moving their money into a fictitious fund or paying for a fake investment, usually using the lure of a high return. While the frauds can involve assets such as gold, wine, property, carbon credits and land, it is thought that fake cryptocurrency tops the list.
The banking body UK Finance, which issued the data, said industry intelligence pointed to “an ongoing prevalence of scams related to cryptocurrencies and the promise of significant returns advertised on social media”.
For the victims, it often starts by clicking on a (fake) social media advert or news alert or watching a deepfake video. This typically is a tip for a supposedly lucrative crypto investment, but is in fact a trick that leads to fraudsters impersonating a real business.
Investors often hand over a relatively small sum at first – perhaps £250 – and, thanks to sophisticated tools used by the scammers, such as software that displays a seemingly live crypto trading screen, they think they are getting rich.
Victims typically lose bigger sums trying to cash out, with their “winnings” always blocked by the need for another payment, which might be a broker’s fee or a tax bill.
In March the Guardian reported on a crypto scam operating from the former Soviet state of Georgia that tricked people in the UK out of £9m. Deepfake videos and fictional news reports featuring the likes of the money expert Martin Lewis were used to promote the fake investments.
Some individuals, including people who work in finance, have been conned out of hundreds of thousands of pounds.
The UK Finance findings are likely to increase calls for cryptocurrency firms and trade bodies to play a bigger part in industry efforts to fight fraud through collaboration.
On Wednesday, Stop Scams UK held a behind-closed-doors roundtable for firms in the banking, telecoms and technology sectors, which was attended by the Bank of England governor, Andrew Bailey, and the fraud minister, Lord Hanson.
It is understood that some attendees were keen for the cryptocurrency sector to participate in a continuing collaboration, with firms working together to share data and propose solutions.
UK Finance is calling on the government’s forthcoming fraud strategy “to ensure all sectors are accountable in preventing fraud”.
Another area where there was a “concerning” increase in fraud losses was romance scams, where victims were tricked into believing they were in a relationship, with the total amount stolen up 35% on last year.
There was a 27% increase in contactless card fraud in the first six months of 2025.
Many experts believe that the true totals are much higher, as many scam victims do not report the crime, often because they feel embarrassed or ashamed.
Responding to the data, the Payments Association, a trade body, said UK policymakers had “failed to address the main issue: blocking fraud at source, preventing crime from happening and mandating responsibility for social media”.
Richard Daniels, director of fraud at the bank TSB, said these crimes were being driven and enabled by “vulnerabilities in other sectors – especially social media”. He added: “Phone companies and social media platforms must urgently act to cut scam content off at source.”
