An alleged serial scammer went on a four-month crime spree, using a popular online marketplace to trick victims into trying to sell him goods, according to police.
The Melbourne man, who is in custody, is facing 65 charges, including the alleged theft of a mobile phone worth $2000, which he pretended he was interested in buying from sellers on Facebook’s Marketplace.
Footage from the incident two months ago shows the man meeting two men on the alleged pretext of buying the phone, but instead grabbing it from the seller’s hand and running down the street.
Nigel Phair, Professor at Monash University in the Department of Software Systems and Cybersecurity Seven news that not all thefts involving online platforms were high-tech.
A Melbourne man is facing more than 60 charges over what police say was a four-month crime spree over Facebook Marketplace
“Some scams are more sophisticated, but some are based on old-fashioned trust deception,” he said.
‘If there is a physical exchange taking place, always meet that person in a public place, tell people you are going there and indeed take other people with you.’
He called up online marketplaces to invest much more money in their trust and security mechanisms.
“They need to take down those fake profiles and the legitimate profiles where people are scammers,” he said.
“Australians are a rich jurisdiction. We love being online and we love buying and selling online.
In one of the alleged crimes, he posed as a buyer for a $2,000 cell phone but simply grabbed it from the seller’s hand and ran away
‘The criminals internationally and in Australia know this and are taking advantage of our vulnerabilities.’
The Australian Competition and Consumer Commission’s Scamwatch service said it received 301,791 scam reports in 2023, a 26 per cent increase on 2022.
This amounted to financial losses totaling more than $480 million.