Australia’s oldest bank, Westpac, announced The bank said it has blocked a number of cryptocurrency exchanges as part of an experiment to “reduce fraud losses.”
According to Westpac’s internal data, half of fraud losses are due to investment fraud, and a third of fraudulent payments are routed to cryptocurrency exchanges. The Australian Competition and Consumer Commission’s Scamwatch also said last month that investment fraud made up the majority of fraud reported to Scamwatch, ReportCyber, the Australian Financial Crimes Exchange, IDCare and ASIC.
Scott Coralee, head of customer service and technology at Westpac Group, said the bank’s move to block trading to cryptocurrency exchanges could save customers millions of dollars.
Coralie added:
“In many cases, our customers realize they have been scammed only after their money has left the country, making recovery very difficult.
A trial of new security measures will help us better protect our customers from fraud. Specifically, it targets investment fraud that has a devastating impact on our clients. ”
The bank did not name Binance, but the exchange is believed to be affected. Chris Whittingham, Westpac’s General Manager of Risk and Fraud, said: Said Fraudulent Australian Financial Reviews are usually sent to ‘high-risk’ overseas exchanges.
Binance Australia had its derivatives trading license revoked last month. The exchange is also under investigation by the Australian Securities and Investments Commission (ASIC) for allegedly violating its license by offering derivatives trading to individual Australian traders.
problems on many fronts
Earlier today, Binance Australia announced that it could no longer process PayID Australian dollar deposits. This is because Cuscal, a third-party service provider, has restricted access.
Binance and its CEO Zhao Changpeng are also facing lawsuits by the Commodity Futures Trading Commission in the United States. A lawsuit filed in March alleges that Binance operates an illegal exchange and violates market laws.
At the time, a Binance spokesperson called the lawsuit “unexpected and disappointing,” saying that Binance has been working with regulators for two years.
Last month, CFTC Chairman Rostin Benham said that Binance intentionally and willfully violated market laws by soliciting and offering futures contracts and derivatives to U.S. customers.
An article about Australia’s oldest bank banning payments to Binance first appeared on CryptoSlate.
