Scams and Fraud in Canada 2026
Canada is in the grip of a fraud crisis that no government program, awareness campaign, or regulatory intervention has yet managed to reverse. In 2025, the Canadian Anti-Fraud Centre (CAFC) — Canada’s central repository for fraud intelligence, jointly operated by the Royal Canadian Mounted Police (RCMP), the Competition Bureau of Canada, and the Ontario Provincial Police (OPP) — recorded over $704 million in reported fraud losses, the highest single-year total in the CAFC’s history. That figure alone would be alarming enough, but the CAFC consistently estimates that only 5 to 10 per cent of fraud incidents are ever reported to authorities. Applying that reporting rate to the 2025 total means the real annual cost of scams in Canada is likely somewhere between $7 billion and $14 billion — an invisible economic haemorrhage affecting millions of Canadian households, businesses, and seniors each year. Since 2022, reported losses alone have surpassed $2.4 billion, a figure that excludes the vast majority of incidents that go unrecorded entirely.
The federal government’s response to this escalating crisis reached a formal milestone on 30 March 2026, when Finance Minister François-Philippe Champagne launched public consultations on Canada’s first-ever whole-of-government National Anti-Fraud Strategy — an initiative announced in Budget 2025 and described as a decisive step toward a “more secure financial landscape.” The strategy aims to address the full fraud lifecycle, from blocking initial scammer contact through to disrupting payment flows and recovering losses. It arrives at a moment when the nature of fraud in Canada is changing rapidly: AI-generated deepfakes, ghost texts, voice-cloning impersonations, and pig-butchering investment schemes have replaced older, more easily recognised scam formats. A March 2026 RBC poll of over 1,500 Canadian adults found that 81% feel there is a new scam to watch out for almost every week, and 83% say the safest default is to treat every unexpected text, email, or call as a potential fraud. The data, the lived experience, and the policy response have all arrived at the same conclusion: fraud is no longer a peripheral consumer protection issue in Canada — it is a national financial security emergency.
Key Facts About Scams & Frauds in Canada 2026
FAST FACTS — Scams and Fraud in Canada 2026
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Total reported fraud losses (2025) : $704 million CAD ← Record
Total reported fraud losses (2024) : $643.7 million CAD
Total reported fraud losses (2022–2025) : $2.4 billion+ CAD
Total fraud reports received (2025) : 112,000+
Estimated true annual losses (2025) : $7B–$14B CAD
Fraud incidents reported (est.) : Only 5–10% of all incidents
Top fraud by volume (2025) : Identity fraud (8,403 reports)
Top fraud by dollar loss (2025) : Investment fraud ($351 million)
Avg loss per individual (2024) : $15,028 CAD
Cyber-enabled fraud share of losses (2024): 75%
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| Key Fact | Statistic |
|---|---|
| Total reported fraud losses — 2025 | $704 million CAD (record high) |
| Total reported fraud losses — 2024 | $643.7 million CAD |
| Total reported fraud losses — 2022 | $531 million CAD |
| Reported losses since 2022 (cumulative) | Over $2.4 billion CAD |
| Increase in losses since 2020 | Nearly 4× increase ($165M in 2020 → $704M in 2025) |
| Total fraud reports received by CAFC (2025) | Over 112,000 |
| Fraud reports received by CAFC (2024) | 108,878 |
| Estimated reporting rate (fraud victims) | Only 5–10% report to CAFC |
| Estimated true annual fraud losses (2025) | $7 billion – $14 billion CAD |
| Top fraud by report volume (2025) | Identity fraud (8,403 reports) |
| Top fraud by dollar loss (2025) | Investment fraud ($351 million) |
| Average individual fraud loss (2024) | $15,028 CAD |
| Cyber-enabled fraud — share of total losses (2024) | 75% ($481.6 million) |
| Fraud types tracked by CAFC | 30+ distinct types |
| National Anti-Fraud Strategy consultation launched | 30 March 2026 |
| Canadians believing a new scam appears weekly (2026) | 81% (RBC poll, March 2026) |
| Canadians treating unexpected contact as a potential scam | 83% (RBC poll, March 2026) |
Source: Canadian Anti-Fraud Centre (CAFC) — Top 10 Frauds in 2025 (published February 2026); CAFC 2024 Annual Statistical Report; Government of Canada — National Anti-Fraud Strategy Discussion Paper, March 2026; RBC Fraud Prevention Month Poll, March 2026
The headline figure of $704 million in reported losses in 2025 is record-breaking in the most sobering sense: it confirms a near-unbroken year-on-year escalation that has seen fraud losses in Canada more than quadruple since 2020, when the CAFC recorded just $165 million. The cumulative impact since 2022 now exceeds $2.4 billion in reported losses alone — a number that represents just the visible fraction of the true damage. With only 5 to 10 per cent of fraud incidents making it into CAFC records, the actual national toll in 2025 is conservatively estimated between $7 billion and $14 billion CAD, a range that would make fraud one of the single largest sources of financial loss affecting Canadian households. The 75% share of losses attributable to cyber-enabled fraud in 2024 confirms what enforcement agencies have been warning for years: the internet is not merely a delivery channel for scams — it is the primary infrastructure that allows fraud to scale across borders and reach millions of potential victims simultaneously at negligible cost to the perpetrators.
The average individual loss of $15,028 CAD in 2024 reflects the skewing effect of catastrophic investment fraud cases, which often run into hundreds of thousands of dollars per victim. For Canadians caught up in the most serious fraud types — investment scams, romance fraud, and spear phishing — the financial devastation is life-altering, not merely inconvenient. The CAFC’s 30+ documented fraud categories, combined with the government’s acknowledgement that tactics range from “ghost texts and mysterious links to masked voiceover calls and phony bank emails,” paint a picture of a threat environment so varied and adaptive that no single countermeasure can contain it. The National Anti-Fraud Strategy, launched for public consultation in March 2026, is the federal government’s clearest statement yet that piecemeal responses to this crisis are no longer adequate.
Top 10 Scam Types in Canada by Reports and Losses 2026
TOP FRAUDS — DOLLAR LOSS RANKING (Canada 2025, CAD)
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Investment fraud ████████████████████████████████████████ $351.0M
Spear phishing █████ $67.9M
Relationship/Romance ████ $63.3M
Job fraud ████ $50.6M
Fraud investigator ██ $28.3M
Recovery pitch ██ $25.9M
Extortion █ $23.0M
Service fraud █ $19.5M
Merchandise █ $11.7M
Prize fraud ▌ $5.7M
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| Fraud Type | Reports (2025) | Victims (2025) | Dollar Loss (2025) |
|---|---|---|---|
| Identity fraud | 8,403 | 8,403 | N/A (not financial) |
| Investment fraud | 4,409 | 3,867 | $351 million |
| Service fraud | 3,393 | 2,444 | $19.5 million |
| Personal information | 3,016 | 2,109 | N/A (not financial) |
| Phishing | 2,869 | 467 | N/A (not financial) |
| Extortion | 2,767 | 835 | $23 million |
| Merchandise fraud | 2,596 | 2,222 | $11.7 million |
| Fraud investigator scam | 2,167 | 1,137 | $28.3 million |
| Job fraud | 2,148 | 1,726 | $50.6 million |
| Relationship/Romance scam | 1,093 | 933 | $63.3 million |
| Spear phishing | 813 | 571 | $67.9 million |
| Recovery pitch | 933 | 569 | $25.9 million |
| Prize fraud | 403 | 151 | $5.7 million |
Source: Canadian Anti-Fraud Centre (CAFC) — Top 10 Frauds in 2025, published 25 February 2026
The divergence between the volume ranking and the dollar loss ranking of Canadian scam types in 2025 reveals the most important structural feature of fraud in this country: the scams that affect the most people are not the same scams that cause the most financial damage. Identity fraud tops the volume chart with 8,403 reports — but because identity fraud involves the theft of personal information rather than direct financial transfers, it does not generate a direct dollar loss figure in CAFC statistics (though the downstream financial consequences for victims can be severe). Investment fraud, by contrast, sits second by report volume but overwhelmingly first by dollar loss, accounting for $351 million of the $704 million total — approximately 50% of all reported losses from just 4,409 reports. This means the average confirmed investment fraud victim lost approximately $90,700 CAD, a figure that reflects the devastating scale of crypto-platform scams, pig-butchering schemes, and fake trading portals that dominate this category.
The spear phishing figure deserves particular attention: $67.9 million in losses from just 813 reports translates to an average loss of approximately $83,765 per victim — second only to investment fraud on a per-case basis. Spear phishing involves highly personalised, targeted email attacks that impersonate trusted institutions or individuals, and its high per-victim damage reflects both the sophistication of the method and the fact that it is increasingly AI-assisted. Romance scams, which generated $63.3 million from 933 victims, similarly carry a devastating per-victim loss of approximately $67,844 CAD on average — and they carry emotional and psychological damage that financial figures cannot capture. The job fraud category, which produced $50.6 million in losses, reflects the emergence of fake employment offers — often involving fake task-completion apps or money-mule recruitment — that now rank among the top financial threats facing younger Canadians.
Investment Fraud and Crypto Scams in Canada 2026
INVESTMENT FRAUD — ANNUAL LOSS TREND (Canada, CAD reported losses)
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2022 ████████████████████████████████████████ $308.6 million
2023 ████████████████████████████████████████▌ $309.4 million
2024 ████████████████████████████████████████▌ $310–$313 million
2025 ████████████████████████████████████████████████████ $351 million ← Record
46% of Canadians say they have seen investment fraud on social media
(CSA 2024 Investor Index Survey)
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| Investment & Crypto Fraud Metric | Data |
|---|---|
| Investment fraud losses — 2025 | $351 million CAD (record) |
| Investment fraud losses — 2024 | $310–$313 million CAD |
| Investment fraud losses — 2023 | $309.4 million CAD |
| Investment fraud losses — 2022 | $308.6 million CAD |
| Investment fraud as share of total 2025 losses | ~50% |
| Investment fraud reports to CAFC — 2025 | 4,409 reports |
| Investment fraud confirmed victims — 2025 | 3,867 |
| Average loss per investment fraud victim (2024) | ~$90,554 CAD (60+ age group) |
| Canadians seeing investment fraud on social media | 46% (CSA 2024 Investor Index Survey) |
| Average crypto transaction loss (2024) | $23,815 CAD per transaction |
| Crypto losses Jan–Sep 2024 (CAFC) | $94 million CAD |
| Crypto losses — full year 2023 | $124 million CAD |
| Ontario crypto investment fraud losses (Jan–Sep 2024) | ~$23 million CAD |
| Most common investment scam format | Fake crypto trading platform (victim unable to withdraw) |
| Scam types frequently used as entry point | Romance scam → investment pitch (“pig butchering”) |
| For first time, investment fraud trend for younger Canadians | Trending upward (CSA, 2025) |
Source: CAFC — Top 10 Frauds in 2025; CAFC 2024 Annual Statistical Report; Canadian Securities Administrators (CSA) / RCMP joint release, March 2025; CBC News, December 2024
Investment fraud has been the single largest driver of fraud losses in Canada in every year since 2022, and in 2025 it reached a new peak of $351 million — more than double the combined losses of the next four fraud categories combined. The dominant format driving this category is the fake cryptocurrency trading platform: a victim is directed — typically through social media advertising, a romance approach, or an unsolicited message — to download a trading app and transfer cryptocurrency into an account. Initial “returns” appear convincingly on screen, encouraging the victim to invest more. When the victim attempts to withdraw, they are told to pay additional fees or taxes. The funds are, in virtually every case, unrecoverable. Ontario Provincial Police Detective-Constable John Armit, who specialises in crypto fraud, has warned that “once you send your crypto, it’s virtually gone” — a statement that captures the particular cruelty of this scam format, which is designed to appear legitimate until the victim is fully committed. The $23,815 average crypto transaction loss recorded in 2024 is among the highest per-transaction figures of any payment method tracked by CAFC.
A particularly important shift captured in the CSA’s 2024 Investor Index Survey is the finding that, for the first time since the CSA began tracking investment fraud trends, scam rates among younger Canadians are trending upward. Previously, older Canadians were considered the primary target for investment fraud; the rising victimisation of younger age groups reflects the migration of fraudulent investment pitches onto social media platforms and messaging apps where younger demographics spend the most time. 46% of Canadians said they had encountered investment opportunities promoted on social media — a figure that underscores how thoroughly fraud has colonised the same digital channels that legitimate financial services use to reach customers. The combined warnings from the CSA, CAFC, and RCMP issued in March 2025 described the situation as an “escalating threat” and called for greater public vigilance specifically around online investment opportunities, recognising that the sophistication of modern scams makes them genuinely difficult to distinguish from legitimate platforms.
Senior Fraud Victims in Canada 2026
SENIORS (60+) vs OVERALL FRAUD BURDEN — Canada 2024
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Share of Canadian population (60+)
████████████████████████ ~23%
Share of CAFC fraud reports filed (60+)
████████████████████████████ ~28% (12,801 reports)
Share of total dollar losses absorbed (60+)
████████████████████████████████████████ 40.3% ($179.9 million)
Average loss per senior fraud victim (2024)
████████████████████████████████████████████ $21,604 CAD
Investment fraud — avg loss per senior victim (2024)
████████████████████████████████████████████████████████ $90,554 CAD
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| Senior Fraud Metric (aged 60+) | Data |
|---|---|
| Senior share of Canadian population | ~23% |
| CAFC reports filed by seniors (2024) | 12,801 reports |
| Senior share of total fraud dollar losses (2024) | 40.3% ($179.9 million) |
| Average loss per senior fraud victim (2024) | $21,604 CAD |
| Top fraud by volume — seniors | Service fraud (1,887 reports; 78.3% victimisation rate) |
| Second most common — seniors | Identity fraud (1,684 reports; 100% victimisation rate) |
| Third most common — seniors | Investment fraud (1,285 reports; 95.6% victimisation rate) |
| Investment fraud — average loss per senior victim | $90,554 CAD |
| Seniors’ investment fraud losses (2024) | $111.3 million (36% of all investment fraud losses) |
| Under-50s — more likely to | Report fraud to CAFC |
| Over-50s — more likely to | Lose more money per incident |
| Scam specifically targeting seniors | Grandparent Scam; Bank Investigator Scam |
| Fraud targeting pension/retirement savings | RRSP, RRIF, and pension-specific fraud approaches |
| Under-19s — characterised as | Most likely age group to be victimised by fraud |
Source: CAFC 2024 Annual Statistical Report; CAFC — Top 10 Frauds in 2025; Department of Finance Canada — National Anti-Fraud Strategy Discussion Paper, 2026
The disproportion between how much of Canada’s senior population (about 23%) absorbs relative to total fraud losses (over 40%) is one of the most troubling features of the national fraud picture. Seniors aged 60 and over lost $179.9 million to fraud in 2024 alone — a figure that, when divided across 8,327 confirmed senior victims, yields an average loss of $21,604 per person. For investment fraud specifically, the average senior loss was an extraordinary $90,554 CAD. These are not small disruptions to household finances; at these sums, fraud routinely destroys retirement savings, depletes RRSP and RRIF accounts, and leaves older Canadians without the financial resources they planned to depend on for the remainder of their lives. The 100% victimisation rate for senior identity fraud reports — meaning every senior who filed an identity fraud report with the CAFC in 2024 was a confirmed victim — reflects both the targeting precision of fraudsters and the particular vulnerability of older Canadians to impersonation-based scams that claim to be from banks, government agencies, or law enforcement.
The Grandparent Scam and Bank Investigator Scam remain among the most widely documented senior-targeting fraud formats in Canada. The Grandparent Scam involves a caller pretending to be a grandchild in urgent distress (arrested, hospitalised, involved in an accident), requesting immediate cash or gift cards. The Bank Investigator Scam convinces the victim they are participating in a legitimate police investigation of their own bank, persuading them to hand over their physical debit or credit card and PIN to a courier. Both scams exploit the trust, urgency, and emotional availability of older Canadians — qualities that fraudsters have long recognised and systematically weaponised. The CAFC’s finding that individuals under 50 are more likely to report fraud while those over 50 lose more money on average reflects a reporting gap that almost certainly means senior losses are even more underrepresented in the official data than the broader population average.
Fraud by Province in Canada 2026
FRAUD LOSSES BY PROVINCE — Canada 2024 (CAFC reported losses, CAD)
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Ontario ████████████████████████████████████████ $219.1 million
British Columbia ████████████████ $79.8 million
Alberta ████████████ ~$60+ million
Quebec ██████████ $55.1 million
Manitoba █████ (high per-capita rate)
Yukon ████ (highest per-capita rate)
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| Provincial Fraud Metric | Data |
|---|---|
| Highest total fraud losses (2024) | Ontario — $219.1 million |
| Ontario investment fraud losses (2024) | $102.7 million |
| Second highest total losses | British Columbia — $79.8 million |
| BC investment fraud losses (2024) | $42.8 million |
| Third highest total losses | Alberta (~$60+ million total) |
| Alberta investment fraud losses (2024) | $32.8 million |
| Quebec total losses (2024) | $55.1 million |
| Quebec — per-capita CAFC report rate | 121 per 100,000 (highest of major provinces) |
| Manitoba — per-capita CAFC report rate | 128 per 100,000 (highest per-capita among larger provinces) |
| Yukon — per-capita CAFC report rate | 142 per 100,000 (highest in Canada) |
| Alberta — self-reported fraud victimisation rate | 22% (highest of any province) |
| Investment fraud as top fraud category by dollar loss | 12 of 13 provinces and territories |
| Provinces with highest report volumes | Ontario, Quebec, British Columbia (reflects population) |
| Service fraud and identity fraud frequency | Consistently high across all provinces |
Source: CAFC 2024 Annual Statistical Report; Discreet Investigations — Fraud Statistics Canada, May 2026 (compiled from CAFC data)
The provincial breakdown of Canadian fraud losses reveals both expected patterns driven by population distribution and some genuinely surprising outliers. Ontario leads all provinces by a very wide margin with $219.1 million in total losses in 2024 — more than twice British Columbia’s $79.8 million — driven heavily by the province’s concentration of investment fraud losses at $102.7 million. Ontario’s large urban centres, particularly Toronto and the Greater Toronto Area, are home to a disproportionate share of the high-net-worth individuals who investment fraudsters specifically target. British Columbia’s $79.8 million is notable given its population (roughly one-third of Ontario’s), suggesting a higher per-capita exposure, likely reflecting BC’s concentration of real estate wealth and the province’s historically elevated cryptocurrency adoption rates. Investment fraud was the top category by dollar loss in 12 of Canada’s 13 provinces and territories — a finding that underscores just how nationally pervasive this single fraud type has become.
The territorial picture is particularly striking from a per-capita perspective. Yukon’s per-capita CAFC report rate of 142 per 100,000 is the highest in the country, and Manitoba’s 128 per 100,000 among larger provinces suggests that fraud is not merely a big-city problem. Alberta’s 22% self-reported fraud victimisation rate — the highest of any province — likely reflects a combination of the province’s oil-sector wealth, its relatively high proportion of independent business owners who are frequent targets of business email compromise, and historically lower-than-average fraud awareness. The contrast between Quebec’s high per-capita report rate (121 per 100,000) and its comparatively low total losses ($55.1 million) is analytically interesting: it suggests Quebec residents are more likely to report lower-value fraud incidents, and perhaps less likely to fall for the large-scale investment scams that generate catastrophic individual losses in Ontario and BC.
Cyber-Enabled Fraud and Payment Methods in Canada 2026
PAYMENT METHODS — FRAUD LOSSES (Canada 2024, by method)
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Cryptocurrency
████████████████████████████████████████ Highest total loss & avg/txn
Avg. per crypto transaction: $23,815 CAD
E-Transfer
████████████████████████████ +26.1% increase in dollar losses
(following May 2024 limit increase to $10,000 per transfer)
Direct deposit
████████████████ Volume down 4.6% — dollar loss +98.8%
Cyber-enabled fraud share of ALL losses (2024)
████████████████████████████████████████████████████████████ 75%
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| Cyber & Payment Fraud Metric | Data |
|---|---|
| Cyber-enabled fraud — share of total losses (2024) | 75% ($481.6 million of $643.7 million) |
| Average cryptocurrency transaction loss (2024) | $23,815 CAD |
| Crypto losses Jan–Sep 2024 | $94 million CAD |
| Crypto losses — full year 2023 | $124 million CAD |
| E-Transfer dollar loss increase (2024) | +26.1% (following $10,000 limit increase, May 2024) |
| Direct deposit — volume change (2024) | Down 4.6% |
| Direct deposit — dollar loss change (2024) | Up 98.8% |
| Primary fraud types using cryptocurrency | Investment fraud, job fraud, romance scams |
| Social media fraud losses — 2023 | $172 million CAD |
| Canadians who say online ad authenticity is harder to verify | 87% (RBC poll, March 2026) |
| Canadians finding it harder to verify website legitimacy | 75% (RBC poll, March 2026) |
| AI described as | “Industrialising” identity fraud (Facephi/DIACC, March 2026) |
| Bill C-8 (cybersecurity legislation) status | Passed House Third Reading 26 March 2026; Senate First Reading same day |
| Bill C-8 penalty per violation per day | Up to $15 million CAD |
Source: CAFC 2024 Annual Statistical Report; RBC Fraud Prevention Month Poll, March 2026; Government of Canada — National Anti-Fraud Strategy Discussion Paper, March 2026; Cybersecurity Canada Report 2026
Cyber-enabled fraud — fraud that relies on internet-based solicitation methods, digital payment systems, or online platforms — now accounts for 75% of all reported fraud losses in Canada, a dominance that reflects how thoroughly the fraud ecosystem has migrated to digital infrastructure. The $23,815 average cryptocurrency transaction loss tells part of the story: crypto is the payment method of choice for the highest-value fraud types because it is fast, largely irreversible, difficult to trace across international borders, and increasingly accessible to mainstream Canadians. The $10,000 e-Transfer limit increase implemented by Canadian financial institutions in May 2024 contributed to a 26.1% rise in e-Transfer fraud losses — an unintended consequence of a consumer-convenience measure that fraudsters were able to exploit almost immediately. The simultaneous drop in direct deposit fraud volume (down 4.6%) alongside a near-doubling of its dollar losses (up 98.8%) suggests that fraudsters are shifting focus from high-frequency, low-value attacks to fewer but significantly larger individual thefts through this channel.
The technology dimension of this picture is accelerating sharply in 2026. The DIACC member Facephi described AI as having “industrialised identity fraud” — a characterisation that matches the RBC poll finding that 87% of Canadians now find it harder to determine whether an online advertisement is real or fraudulent. Voice-cloning, deepfake video, and AI-generated phishing messages have narrowed the gap between what a scam looks like and what legitimate communication looks like. The government’s Bill C-8 — which passed the House of Commons on 26 March 2026 and entered Senate First Reading the same day — imposes penalties of up to $15 million CAD per violation per day on federally regulated critical infrastructure operators for cybersecurity failures, marking a significant legislative escalation in Canada’s approach to the infrastructure that enables digital fraud. Whether that translates into meaningfully lower fraud losses for ordinary Canadians will be one of the defining policy questions of the next several years.
Fraud Reporting Trends and Consumer Awareness in Canada 2026
FRAUD REPORTING GAP — Estimated vs Reported (Canada 2025)
━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━
Reported losses (CAFC 2025)
██ $704 million CAD ← only 5–10% of incidents
Estimated TRUE losses (applying 10× multiplier)
████████████████████ $7 billion – $14 billion CAD
Canadians who feel there is a new scam to watch for weekly (2026)
████████████████████████████████████████████ 81%
Canadians treating ALL unexpected contact as a potential scam
█████████████████████████████████████████████ 83%
Canadians who believe online ads are getting harder to identify as real
███████████████████████████████████████████████ 87%
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| Fraud Reporting and Awareness Metric | Data |
|---|---|
| Estimated reporting rate — fraud incidents | Only 5–10% reported to CAFC |
| True annual losses (CAFC’s own estimate, 2025) | $7 billion – $14 billion CAD |
| Cumulative reported losses 2022–2025 | Over $2.4 billion CAD |
| Reasons for non-reporting | Embarrassment, stigma, lack of confidence in process |
| Canadians: new scam to watch for almost every week | 81% (RBC, March 2026) |
| Canadians treating unexpected contact as a likely scam | 83% (RBC, March 2026) |
| Canadians finding it harder to identify fraudulent online ads | 87% (RBC, March 2026) |
| Canadians finding it harder to verify website legitimacy | 75% (RBC, March 2026) |
| Year-on-year loss increase (2024 to 2025) | +$60.3 million ($643.7M → $704M) |
| National Anti-Fraud Strategy consultation period | 30 March – 30 April 2026 |
| CAFC reporting mechanism | Online via reportcyberandfraud.canada.ca or 1-888-495-8501 |
| CAFC’s stated concern — underreporting consequence | Lower odds of catching scammers; policy built on incomplete data |
| Operation supported by CAFC (June 2026) | Operation FRONTIER+III — international action to disrupt fraud |
Source: Government of Canada — Department of Finance, National Anti-Fraud Strategy press release, 30 March 2026; RBC Fraud Prevention Month Poll, March 2026 (n=1,500+ Canadian adults); CAFC — Fraud Prevention Month 2026
The reporting gap is not a minor statistical footnote — it is the central distortion that makes Canada’s fraud problem far more serious than even the record-breaking $704 million in 2025 losses would suggest. When only 5 to 10 per cent of fraud victims come forward, the CAFC’s entire intelligence picture, enforcement prioritisation, policy funding decisions, and public awareness targeting are all based on a systematically incomplete dataset. The CAFC has explicitly acknowledged the consequences: “When fraud goes unreported, it lowers the odds that scammers will be caught. And it means that policy decisions are based on incomplete information.” The reasons Canadians do not report fraud — embarrassment, stigma, and a lack of confidence in the reporting process — are psychosocial barriers that no cybersecurity measure or fraud-detection algorithm can address. Changing them requires the kind of cultural and institutional shift that the National Anti-Fraud Strategy, launched for consultation in March 2026, aims to begin.
Consumer awareness data from the RBC 2026 Fraud Prevention Month Poll reveals a population that is both increasingly vigilant and increasingly fatigued. The 83% of Canadians who treat every unexpected text, email, or call as a potential scam represents a significant shift in baseline suspicion — but it coexists with the finding that 87% find it harder to distinguish real from fraudulent online advertising. In other words, Canadians know they should be sceptical, but the fraud environment is evolving so rapidly that scepticism alone is no longer sufficient protection. The CAFC’s participation in Operation FRONTIER+III in June 2026 — an international coordinated action to disrupt organised fraud networks — reflects the reality that the most dangerous fraud operations targeting Canadians are run by organised criminal gangs operating outside Canada, a structural challenge that domestic regulatory responses cannot fully address without sustained international law enforcement cooperation.
Disclaimer: The data research report we present here is based on information found from various sources. We are not liable for any financial loss, errors, or damages of any kind that may result from the use of the information herein. We acknowledge that though we try to report accurately, we cannot verify the absolute facts of everything that has been represented.
