Australian real-time intel network stops $60m in scams

November 27, 2025

A real-time intelligence-sharing network used by Australia’s largest banks has uncovered more than $60m in attempted fraud within just three months, according to new data released by BioCatch.

The consortium, known as BioCatch Trust Australia, was launched a year ago to analyse behavioural patterns and identify suspicious activity across participating financial institutions. The network now covers more than 85% of all banked Australians.

In the third quarter of 2025 alone, the system examined over 180m payments worth more than $330bn, uncovering widespread fraud attempts driven largely by organised crime. BioCatch said its technology retrieved beneficiary account profiles in more than 70% of transactions, enabling banks to assess payment risk before funds left customer accounts.

BioCatch SVP of emerging solutions and network Tim Dalgleish said, “In better than 70% of those transactions, BioCatch Trust reliably retrieved the beneficiary’s account profile, assessing the end-to-end payment risk before any money left the sender’s account. When the network makes that match, its signals now detect better than 70% of social engineering scam payments.”

The metrics are part of the company’s new report, 2025 Digital Banking Fraud Trends in Australia, which also highlights a 20% reduction in money laundering activity among its Australian customers. However, account takeover threats have escalated sharply. BioCatch director of global fraud intelligence Thomas Peacock said, “We do see account takeover attempts in Australia increasing by 47% in the last year and more than doubling in the last six months. We can attribute this in large part to coordinated attacks from organized criminal groups.”

A separate contribution from the Australian Payments Network emphasises the need to rethink payment system design. Australian Payments Network head of economic crime Toby Evans said, “The digital payments landscape continues to evolve, from AI-driven e-commerce to cross-border links between fast payment systems … By embedding safety into systems from the start, payments can remain innovative, secure, and resilient without forcing consumers to shoulder risk.”