There is a concerning trend of scammers preying on vulnerable families during their time of grief, and their deceitful activities are on the rise.
Mark Bull, the owner of Bull Family Funerals, regularly faces a barrage of scam attempts as he works on organizing funerals for his clients.
Some scammers have also gone a step further and set up fraudulent fundraising pages with photos of the deceased asking for money.
The Australian government’s National Anti-Scam Centre noticed a spike in this particular scam in December 2023.
“The National Anti-Scam Centre is aware of reports of ‘livestreaming’-related scams circulating on social media,” a spokesperson told 9news.com.au.
“Many of these reports have related to livestreaming sporting events, but we have had reports of this extending to livestreaming funerals.
Bull shared his frustrating experience of constantly dealing with scammers on Facebook who target bereaved Australians, requiring him to dedicate hours to blocking and reporting them.
A spokesperson for Meta, which owns Facebook, said it removes content like this for violating community standards.
“Scams are unfortunately used to deceive, defraud, and manipulate people across the internet,” the spokesperson said.
“That’s why we are continuing to invest in tools and technology to prevent them, alongside working with industry, the government and law enforcement to take steps to improve detection and enforcement.
“We encourage anyone who sees content that might violate our policies to report it so we can investigate and take action.”
Scamwatch publishes information about recent scam activity in Australia, while the ACSC also has a page outlining the types of schemes to be aware of.
If you’ve been scammed and lost money, immediately contact your bank or financial institution and change your passwords.
