Martin Lewis demands government protect consumers from…

Martin Lewis demands government protect consumers from scam advert epidemic

Martin Lewis has been joined by celebrities including Sir Richard Branson and Deborah Meaden in calling on the government to protect Brits from "an epidemic" of scam adverts.

The MoneySavingExpert (MSE) founder has been asking the Prime Minister to include paid-for advertising in its upcoming Online Safety Bill.

At the moment, the draft legislation includes user-generated content but not paid-for adverts.

But Mr Lewis, 49, argues this doesn’t offer anywhere near enough protection for vulnerable Brits - and says scammers will switch to advertising to con their victims.

The money-saving expert has previously warned how households are losing thousands of pounds and lives are being “destroyed” by callous fraudsters.

Martin Lewis has been calling on the government to include paid-for adverts in the Online Safety Bill (PA)

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He has now joined 14 other trusted figures in issuing an open letter to the government calling on paid-for adverts to be included in the Online Safety Bill.

Duncan Bannatyne OBE, Peter Jones CBE, Phillip Schofield, Holly Willoughby and Dawn French are among those who have signed the letter.

Everyone who has included their name has had their face used by scammers in online advertising.

In an appearance in front of the Draft Online Safety Bill Joint Committee last month, Mr Lewis recalled how one woman lost £15,000 after falling victim to scammers who were pretending to be him.

Mr Lewis had also previously issued High Court proceedings for defamation against Facebook after over 1,000 fraudulent adverts abusing his name or image had appeared on the site.

According to Action Fraud and the National Cyber Security Centre, Martin Lewis, Sir Richard Branson and Deborah Meaden are among some of the most-used faces in online fraud.

There are currently few meaningful powers to prevent scam adverts from appearing online, and regulators are unable to punish the big tech platforms that get paid to publish them.

The Home Secretary Priti Patel and current and former Culture Secretaries have said the government wants to tackle online advertising fraud separately to this piece of legislation.

Mr Lewis said: “Right now, the government’s planned Online Safety Bill isn’t just blindly ignoring the epidemic of scam adverts that the UK faces – it’s actually going to make it worse.

Martin Lewis is one of the most-used faces in online fraud (PA)

“By making big tech responsible for user-generated scams but not paid-for scam adverts, it creates an incentive for criminal scammers to switch to advertising.

“To say it will look at scam ads regulation later, likely years away, when this regulation will make it worse, is simply perverse. We can’t wait.

“Scams don’t just steal people’s money, they can take their self-respect too, and those with mental health problems are three times more likely to be affected.

Sir Richard Branson, Virgin Group Founder, said: “We know there has been a sharp rise in scams since the start of the pandemic, and it’s deeply concerning that people may be tricked into parting with their money by someone pretending to be me.

“This is a global issue, and we are doing all we can to unmask scammers, but we can only do this by working together and ensuring the public are protected from these terrifyingly deceptive tactics.”

Dragon’s Den investor Deborah Meaden added: “With the growing sophistication of online fraud, it has becoming glaringly obvious that the government needs to now step in.

“For too long, people have fallen victim to scams because they trusted that myself and others were behind these false ads."