9 in 10 mobile banking scams start on your phone: Report
BioCatch's 2026 report finds scammers favour your phone, while employment scams catch 258% more victims
Nine in every ten scam sessions BioCatch tracked this year started on a mobile phone. Not a laptop. Not a landline. The device in your pocket, with your banking app already open on it.
Mobile banking scams are growing fast. BioCatch's 2026 Global Scams report, covering more than 370 financial institutions across 21 countries, found attempted banking scams rose 35% in 12 months. Mobile's share of scam sessions climbed five points to 90%.
Why are mobile banking scams so hard to stop?
Now scammers don't have to hack into your account; all they need is for you to leave your account open. As per Jonathan Frost of BioCatch, criminals only have to convince customers to transfer the money on their own, making it difficult for banks to identify romance and investment scams.
The panic script and the payment app are just a click away; take care of the rest.
Job scams had the biggest increase, with reported scam victims increasing by 258 per cent. The pitch was simple: high salaries and an appealing job.
Purchase scams still make up the largest number of attempts (33%). Investment scams have the largest costs ($6,600 per attempt).
The figure was 65% in last year’s figures, so 35% indicates a slowing down. Financial institutions that employ behavioural intelligence in detecting attempts at manipulating transactions before approval of payments deserve partial credit.
"AI has lowered the barrier to entry for aspiring scammers," said Thomas Peacock, Director of Global Fraud Intelligence at BioCatch.
Urgency is the warning sign. When a call or message from an unknown source urges the quick payment of a new recipient, the advice is to hang up and phone the bank.
A refund mechanism, for example, where in the UK a refund policy applies, compensates the victim but does nothing to prevent the payment from going to the criminal.
