It starts the way many scams do—quietly and just believable enough. A notification appears on your phone. A suspicious transaction. Your instincts kick in. You check with your bank. Everything seems resolved. Then, days later… the phone rings. And that’s when the real scam begins....

The holiday season should be a time for joy, connection, and giving — not falling victim to fraud. As scammers ramp up their tactics around Christmas, Boxing Day, and New Year's sales, Aussies need to be aware of common seasonal scams and how to avoid them. Scams can happen online, over the phone, by SMS and even in person, and they often cost victims real money and personal data. Here’s a practical guide to the top 12 holiday scams and how to avoid them.

Once upon a time, scam emails were easy to spot — clumsy spelling, strange stories about a foreign prince, and promises of easy money. Those days are gone. Today’s smart scam emails look sharper, sound more believable, and use new tricks (including artificial intelligence) to fool even the savviest of us. Here’s how some of the latest email scams work — and what you can do to protect yourself.

Many of you may have seen reports that Qantas recently had a data breach, confirmed by the airline itself, in which personal data for around six million customers was exposed when a third-party contact-centre system was accessed by cyber criminals. That kind of incident may sound like something for the big boys, but it has real-life consequences for all of us — particularly when it comes to scams via text messages (SMS) and email. Here’s what it means and what you can do