Scam legislation

Published Sep 13, 2024, 1:21 AM

Matthew Pantelis speaks with Assistant Treasurer Stephen Jones who explains the new laws which will place new obligations on banks and other industries to prevent scams.

Listen live on the FIVEAA Player.

Follow us on Facebook, X and Instagram.

 

Open for public consultation from today. Companies that fail to protect their customers from scams could be forced to pay compensation under proposed new laws. You can have your say on this if you like. The federal government will today announce and has today announced major anti scam reforms and this means social media platforms, banks telcodes will have to take greater action to stop Australians being exploited. The fines could total millions. This is a good move, I think. Assistant Treasurer Stephen Jones is on the line. Assistant Treasurer, Good morning, Matthew, good to be with you. So how will this work?

So what we've looked at is how what's the best mechanism possible to provide greater protections for Australian And so we've looked at the ecosystem that scams operate in. They come to us via a telecommunications network for as service manage or a phone call. They come to us via a social media platform via and ad and what's that message? And obviously the bank is the money at the end of the transaction. So we need all of these parts in the ecosystem to lift their protection, do much much more to keep their customers safe. So the new law will put in place obligations on these designated industries to prevent, to detect, to disrupt, to respond to reports of scams, and to report scams themselves to others, to the government, to other agencies within the network. All of it aim to keeping customers safe and preventing a scam from occurring. But if one does get through the system because one of these businesses has done the wrong thing and fail to meet their obligations finds penalties, compensation will follow.

Okay with banks, and banks will tell you, the ABA will certainly tell you they've put in all sorts of procedures and improve their security and try to stop people. You know, the last the question, why are you're using the money while you're taking out this much more? If you're in a branch, And that's all very well and good, but are they they're the last door, I suppose, the last possible way of stopping somebody handing out cash unwillingly, unknowingly to a scammer. Have they done enough? I mean, how do we get to the point where you just can't give your money to a scam? Or is that impossible?

Well, the law of the moment is a bit vague. In some areas, the banks under current law must refund your money if money has left your account and it wasn't an authorized transaction. The problem with scams is so often they're authorized and people have been lured into making these transactions because somebody is pretending to be who they aren't. So we need to improve the law and the protections in these areas. We don't want to get to a situation where a bank will always refuse to honor what a customer has asked them to do, because when you and I put our money in a bank, we do it on the condition the bank let's just take it out when we want to, and let's move it some let' us buy things with it, because it's our money. So we've got to get the balance right between having obligations on them to detect, to prevent and to respond to scams in their ecosystem, but also on the other players within the system as well, because you know, Facebook takes money from advertising and having things on Facebook marketplace, and they're not the only ones. Other social media platforms do as well, so it's a bit odd that they're making money and Australians are losing money out of posting these scam advertising. So we've got to lift the bar there and put new obligations in place there as well. So everybody needs to lift the bar. We'll start with banks and telco's and social media platforms. When we get that nailed out, we'll have to move to other areas of the economy, because we know scams all moved to where the easiest door is to open.

All right, now, certainly what you're saying about social media and the David Koshas of the world, Dick Smiths, Twiggy Forest, who's taking Meta to court over the fake AI videos which look and sound real. They look and sound like the person they're representing telling people to invest their money in cryptocurrency or whatever it might be. Get involved in this ground floor, and I trust it and it's got my approval. I mean, that's just unconscionable for the social media companies to leave these up and for it to go to court for goodness.

Sake, exactly exactly, And one of the obligations we'll have upon them is to pull down that fake material, that criminal content, so report and respond. A key part of the architecture of our new laws and if they don't do it, obviously find some penalties apply. It's unconscionable. But if you're a high profile Australian Twiggies in the US at the moment, he might have the resources to Yeah, that's I think the most Australian stones than whether you're an Olympian or a footballer or whatever. They've all had their identity stolen by the by these gangs to lure Australians into losing money, and we can't tolerate it. We've got to improve the protection.

Is this been done around the world, I imagine other countries would be taking similar steps, So we doing anything different in that regard In this.

I've had a look around the world and I've spoken to my counterparts in other countries. None of them have nailed it. In my view. Some of them just jumped straight to compensation and say, well, somebody loses money, then we'll just make the bank pay. And I can see the superficial attraction in that, but it'll create a honeypot. You'll get every scammer in the world saying, come to Australia. You know it's a victimless crime because the bank will always pay and I think the better approach is to have prevention in place, So that's what we're doing. That's different having new laws which are consumer focused, which are putting obligations for prevention. Yes, compensations are part of it. For the first loomurs prevention. So I think what we're doing is different, and I would argue better than any other country in the world.

Okay, telecommunication companies telcos would have the obligation I imagine under your proposals to try and stop the text that I often get at two or three in the morning telling me I've driven on a toll road and haven't paid, or there's no toll road exactly. Well, there's your big tip number one, but also the parcel that you know is on the way but the address is wrong or whatever, and again haven't ordered anything for ages, so not a problem. But that's the sort of thing I imagine you're trying to stop out to get the tilcos on top of that, but it's hard when the numbers are massed, So how do you how do you get on that and stop the text from coming through.

So we're going to have we've got essentially a blacklist at the moment where we're filtering out millions of calls and messages every week, but still lots coming through because as soon as we create a we put a number on a blacklist and another one pops up. So the under the new arrangements, we're going to have a white less So if you want to send a message out and you say you're a bank, or you say you're a Telko, you say your Australia Post, your name has to be on the register, and the name and the number has to match. And if you try and send something out and it doesn't match with the names on the register, it's blocked. So that's the new approach that we'll be implementing through these arrangements. But you know, as technology is evolves and as new things evolve, we'll want to continually upgrade the requirements on telcos and others to be honest about what we expect is reasonable to keep customers safe.

Yeah, and I suppose to. The thing we've all got to keep in mind is not to be so trusting because and I think older people without any disrespect, meant overly trusting when it came and that's the world they were raised in. You know, we could leave doors open and all the rest in Haim's way back when. But times have changed, and if somebody tells you something on the phone or online, it's ain't necessarily say exactly.

A few tips that I always give when I'm talking about this. Don't press those bloody blue links on your SMS, because that's how scammers lure you off to a fake website. Don't give your information out to an unsolicited call. Don't let somebody remote access into your computer. The scam where they say we've we've noticed, we've detected some suspicious activity on your internet. You just got to let us in there to stop this happening. They're not trying to stop it happening. They're actually the bad guys trying to get into your computer and your bank account and your personal details. So those three things good tips for your listeners to keep themselves safe.

Yep. And so see Consumer the ahable, see the Competition and Consumer Commission that'll be undertaking this and imposing the law here, trying to put it into practice.

They'll be the system wide regulator to ensure that everyone is obeying the law. But we'll also be having a role for the other regulators in the place, in the space as well to ensure they're looking after their part of the ecosystem. If I could use this expression, this is all about raising the bar to ensure we are doing more right across the economy to keep Australian safe.

And you'll expect this to be in place later this year early next.

Yeah, so quick consultation period, like I've been talking to people for quite some time about it, but a consultation period formally over the next three weeks just to make sure we've got the details of the legislation right. I'll make some changes based on that and then getting into Parliament this year as hopefully through as soon as possible. I want this in place. Australians are losing, you know, two point seventy five billion dollars in scams last year and every one of those dollars as a tragedy behind it.

Yeah, one hundred percent. All right, Stephen Jones, appreciate your time. Thank you, good to talk, Assistant Treasurer and Financial Services Minister. Scam legislation going before Parliament which will put the onus on companies to take greater steps to protect customers and will be forced to pay compensation under proposed new laws. So these anti scam reforms will have social media giants, banks Turcos having to take a greater action to stop the exploitation through scams. It is unbelievable what these people will try and do and there's just no conscience behind them, just no soul to these people.