Take sixty calm seconds before transferring a bond, visa fee, airfare, or urgent family request. Tick what happened in the live check stage, or open official government licence registers directly.
Runs privately in your browser. Nothing you tick is transmitted or stored.
1. Select who contacted or billed you:
Check State Real Estate Register & Bond Authority before paying any holding deposit.
2. Tick every warning sign that matches:
Legitimate agents hold verifiable registration numbers on public portals. Match the exact credential format for your transaction type.
State Property Licence + Statutory Rental Bond Authority
Common trap: Impersonators scrape real property photos, claim to be overseas landlords, and ask for a PayID, Zelle, or wire "key deposit" before letting you inspect inside.
How to verify: Match the practitioner number on Service NSW, Consumer Affairs VIC, QLD OFT, WA Consumer Protection, or US ARELLO, and lodge bonds only through official state bond boards.
7-Digit OMARA MARN (AU) / DOJ EOIR (US) / OISC (UK) / CICC (CA)
Common trap: Unregistered "job sponsorship fixers" promise guaranteed work visas on WhatsApp or social media and ask you to transfer visa charges to a personal bank account.
How to verify: In Australia, search the exact 7-digit Migration Agents Registration Number on mara.gov.au and call the phone number recorded on that government entry before sending ID.
ATAS / 8-Digit IATA Numeric Code & MEAA / SAG-AFTRA Franchise
Common trap: Discount flight brokers send unpaid PNR booking screenshots without an issued ticket, while fake modelling scouts demand upfront $1,500 "portfolio shoot" payments.
How to verify: Enter the 13-digit e-ticket number directly on the operating airline website before paying a consolidator, and verify union-franchised talent representation rules.
Real-time AI voice cloning and deepfake video calls (such as the verified HK$200M Arup video conference case) can mimic a relative, lawyer, or executive from seconds of public audio. Agreeing on an offline spoken safe word and hanging up to redial a saved phone number stops synthetic impersonation cold.
Investigating technical voice-clone spectrograms or autonomous AI agent abuse? Explore our sister forensic lab at agenticscam.com.
Stop sending holding deposits, crypto, gift cards, or one-time banking codes. Licensed practitioners never penalise you for checking a public government register first.
Dial the official fraud number printed on the back of your debit or credit card immediately to request an urgent recall or account freeze, then contact local police.
Report free to Scamwatch, IDCARE, and ReportCyber (AU), FBI IC3 and FTC (US), or Action Fraud (UK). Never pay anyone messaging online claiming they can "recover" lost transfers.
Paid privacy tools cannot recover lost bank transfers; always call your bank, police, Scamwatch/IDCARE (AU), Action Fraud (UK), or IC3/FTC (US) free first. If you want to reduce future targeted scam calls by removing leaked phone numbers and addresses from people-search brokers, review these optional services:
Reviewed by Claire Devereaux, Consumer Protection & Verification Editor
Verifies government licence registries and ACCC Scamwatch / FTC consumer fraud advisories.
Last reviewed:
Reviewed every 6 months
AI-assistance & editorial check: Research outlining and formatting are assisted by AI tools in an offline draft workflow. Nothing on this site publishes automatically without verification. A named human editor opens and verifies every primary source link, command snippet, and factual statement prior to publication. See our Editorial Policy and Corrections Policy.
Store your email for plain-English checklists when major rental, travel, tax-time, or AI voice-clone scam patterns emerge. No emails are sent yet.
