Kiwis lost $750K to online scams in past year: Netsafe

11.08.2011
New Zealanders lost more than $750,000 over the past year from "online incidents" according to reports to NetSafe's Orb website. "

The internet safety and security organisation is marking the first anniversary of the founding of its site, , which provides a convenient button for members of the public to report incidents.

The site received almost 1700 reports of online incidents during its first 12 months of operation. A Statistics NZ survey in 2009 put the annual number of incidents at 5600, indicating that Orb is till receiving only a fraction of reports.

At a session at the InternetNZ-organised NetHui earlier this year, NetSafe representatives and other participants reckoned that the actual incidence of attempted scams is considerably under-reported, because some victims are too embarrassed to admit they have fallen for the deception. Many more immediately see through the attempt and simply click away the offending message and forget about it.

NetSafe is encouraging those suffering online scam attempts to "report and help others".

NetHui delegates saw more publicity for scams via non-internet media such as television as a potential way of making those who are not seasoned internet users more "resilient" to online deception.