AI is behind the surge in online scamming as half a billion pounds lost to fraudsters

Published: 22:10, 14 June 2026 | Updated: 22:11, 14 June 2026 More than half a billion pounds were lost to scammers last year as victims are being manipulated by artificial intelligence. AI has lowered the 'barrier to entry' for criminals, with fraud losses involving the technology surging by nearly a fifth. It has helped criminals to make communications appear legitimate, send out messages at scale and mimic people's loved ones, banking body UK Finance said. In four out of ten cases, authorised push payment (APP) scam victims lose their money for good. The jump in APP fraud losses reflects a growth of complex scams that manipulate people into transferring money for counterfeit goods, services or opportunities, the organisation said. APP fraud losses rose sharply to £576.4million, the highest since 2021 during the pandemic, when £583.2million was stolen. UK Finance said 248,070 cases were recorded, a 7 per cent annual increase. More than half a billion pounds were lost to scammers last year as victims are being manipulated by artificial intelligence (File image) Ruth Ray, managing director of economic crime at the firm, said the body is shocked, but not surprised by the figures. She said: 'We are well aware that, particularly with the advent of AI, it lowers the barrier to entry for criminals to make their scams more sophisticated and make more of us vulnerable to and susceptible to clicking on links and content.'  Purchase scams accounted for 71 per cent of cases, with losses at £118.1million. Investment fraud made up the highest share of losses, at £221.5million. Romance fraud losses increased by 23 per cent to £39.2million. But impersonation fraud losses fell by 12 per cent. This occurs when criminals pose as organisations such as a bank or the police. In 2025, banks paid £354.3million to victims of APP fraud, equivalent to 61 per cent of losses. In October 2024, APP fraud reimbursement rules came into force, meaning banks must repay victims, except in cases of customer gross negligence. This applies when a transfer is made to and from a UK bank account and there is an £85,000 reimbursement limit, although banks may choose to repay more. Last year, banks blocked £1.68 billion in unauthorised payment fraud, equivalent to 70p in every £1 of attempted attacks. Despite this, authorised losses remain high as criminals use new technologies to exploit victims. Jonathan Frost, global advisory director at BioCatch, said: 'Financial institutions must detect social engineering in real-time, intervening before funds leave an account, and disrupt the mule accounts that fraudsters rely on.' No comments have so far been submitted. Why not be the first to send us your thoughts, or debate this issue live on our message boards. By posting your comment you agree to our house rules. Do you want to automatically post your MailOnline comments to your Facebook Timeline? Your comment will be posted to MailOnline as usual. Do you want to automatically post your MailOnline comments to your Facebook Timeline? Your comment will be posted to MailOnline as usual We will automatically post your comment and a link to the news story to your Facebook timeline at the same time it is posted on MailOnline. To do this we will link your MailOnline account with your Facebook account. We’ll ask you to confirm this for your first post to Facebook. You can choose on each post whether you would like it to be posted to Facebook. Your details from Facebook will be used to provide you with tailored content, marketing and ads in line with our Privacy Policy.