CBA extends scam disruption technologies as part of 'whole-of-ecosystem' national approach

Commonwealth Bank of Australia (CBA) today announced it is expanding its anti-scam technologies, as part of a national effort to combat the rise of increasingly complex fraud and scams:

• Following a pilot of sophisticated algorithms to identify potential scam phone calls, Scam Indicator - technology which was conceived and developed in partnership with Quantium Telstra¹ to help protect joint Telstra and CBA customers - has gone live.
• CBA will extend its industry-leading NameCheck technology to other organisations who process payments. NameCheck gives customers an indication of whether the name and account details they entered look correct before they make a payment.

CBA Chief Executive Officer Matt Comyn shared the update on CBA’s scam initiatives with Assistant Treasurer and Minister for Financial Services, the Hon Stephen Jones MP, during the Minister’s visit today to CBA's offices in South Eveleigh, Sydney.

Mr Comyn said: “We are focused on helping customers stay safe by improving early detection and prevention of scams and want to make Australia less attractive for scammers.

“While we have seen progress with investment scams reducing following recent changes to cryptocurrency payments, we know the risk of losing money to scams continues to be a top concern for our customers. The battle is ongoing and we must all remain vigilant to scams.

“This type of crime is constantly evolving, so to combat it effectively we must coordinate across financial institutions, telcos, government, social media and digital platforms.”

One common way that scammers operate is to make contact by phone, pressuring their target verbally to make payments. Teams at CBA and Telstra have been working together to leverage sophisticated capabilities from both companies and extend the protection to our joint customer base.

“There's certainly a lot of work that needs to be done and these sorts of partnerships with others in the ecosystem are hugely important. Bringing the strength of different players together provides us with a better chance of stopping the scammers,” Mr Comyn said.

New data released by CBA today shows NameCheck has already helped prevent more than 10,000 scam payments which would have totalled in excess of $38 million, since being introduced earlier this year.²

The NameCheck technology has also reduced mistaken payments by more than $100m since March 2023.³

CBA says it is dedicated to sharing learnings and collaborating widely to build out a “whole-of-ecosystem” approach to combating scams.

“We remain committed to playing our part to address this national priority alongside leading businesses, government, and the broader community. Working collaboratively with all sectors is essential and means that we are all able to do better for the Australian community. It is why we are making our industry-leading NameCheck technology available to other organisations who can help to make payments safer and more reliable,” Mr Comyn said.

Notes for Editors

¹ Last year, Telstra launched Quantium Telstra, a joint venture dedicated to creating AI solutions with the customer at the centre. Quantium Telstra has been instrumental in the development and deployment of Scam Indicator in close consultation with CBA.

² Based on payments made via the CommBank app and NetBank between March and September 2023.

³ Mistaken payments data is based on the situation where a customer enters an incorrect BSB and/or account number for the person they intend to pay and then corrects that after receiving the initial NameCheck result.

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