In 2024, online investment fraud cost Europeans an estimated €4 billion. According to some national law enforcement agencies, the rising incidence of financial scams outpaces traditional crimes like drugs and firearms trafficking.
Now, with the sudden ubiquity of AI, online scam advertisements, deep fake technology and digital trading platforms are accelerating the manipulation of consumers, leading to financial losses and serious data breaches that impact individuals, businesses and public institutions.
Yet the amount of fraudulent ads is overwhelming to those tasked with stopping the crimes.
Investigate Europe and the Balkan Investigative Reporting Network teamed up with media partners across Europe to shed light on some of the actors allegedly behind these crimes, along with the social media platforms that enable them to flourish and the EU and national regulatory bodies that are struggling to tackle this issue.
In the first part of the investigative series, Scam Europe, the team looks at the root of some of the scams, exposing an alleged network of individuals connected to a vast financial fraud operation out of call centres in Belgrade, which profited over €250 million and claimed 70,000 victims in Europe, Canada and Australia.
The second part reveals some of the ways online financial scams are metastasising across the continent, highlighting how different European countries are fighting this problem in specific ways.
They show how fraudulent companies create a veneer of legitimacy through advertising and partnership with credible organisations happy to provide a platform for their services. Finally, the journalists give voice to the victims themselves — who reveal how quickly a harmless-looking investment query can unravel into serious financial losses.
The investigation was led and coordinated by the Balkan Investigative Reporting Network and Investigate Europe. The Scam Europe series is published with media partners including Altreconomia, Balkan Insight, EU Observer, The Irish Times, La Libre, Netzpolitik.org, Público and Der Standard.
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Team leaders and editors: Milorad Ivanovic and Mei-Ling McNamara
Journalists: Maxience Peigne, Sasa Dragojlo, Besar Likmenta, Nico Schmidt, Pascal Hansens, Lorenzo Buzzoni, Paula Zwolenski, Aleksandar Djordjevic, Vasko Magleshov
See the stories below.