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UK scammers who hack social media and email accounts have stolen £6.3 million in the 2025-26 financial year, marking a 400% increase from £1.2 million in the previous year. Scammers often impersonate victims to sell fake event tickets or use deceptive tactics like pretending to be a family member in need of urgent money. The City of London police’s Report Fraud service highlights that many incidents go unreported due to embarrassment or because losses are small, and warns that compromised accounts can lead to broader personal and financial consequences for the victim's contacts.
Written locally by qwen2.5:14b on 2026-10-05,
using this article's own text rather than the other coverage of the
same event (that is the story summary below).
Story summary
The total amount stolen through email and social media account hacking in the UK has surged by more than 400% within a year, increasing from £1.2m in 2024-25 to £6.3m in 2025-26, according to data from the Report Fraud service managed by the City of London police. Scammers often hijack victims' accounts to sell fake event tickets, such as those for sold-out gigs, convincing friends and family that they are interacting with the actual account holder. For instance, a music fan’s Instagram was compromised, leading hackers to steal £1,400 from her contacts by pretending to be her while advertising false ticket sales for an Oasis concert. Many victims refrain from reporting such incidents due to embarrassment or because the individual amounts stolen are small, suggesting that actual losses could be significantly higher than reported figures.
Written for “Social Media Scams Rising” on 2026-10-05,
grounded in this article and the 0 other(s) covering the same event.
Why this leaning score
This article does not take a side on a contested political
question, so it has no leaning score. That is an
answer rather than a gap: a match report or a rescue can be warmly
or critically written without being left or right, and scoring it
anyway is how approval of a subject gets recorded as a political
position.
No political leaning scored for article 56314 · logged 2026-10-05
The total amount stolen by criminals who hack into people’s emails and social media accounts and then pretend to be them has risen by more than 400% in a year, official UK data shows.
asserted
data → steal → year
In many cases, the scammers are hijacking people’s accounts in order to use their identity to sell fake event tickets – such as to sold-out gigs – to unsuspecting friends and family.
asserted
scammers → hijack → friends
The total reported amount stolen via email and social media account hacking reached £6.3m in the 2025-26 financial year, compared with £1.2m in 2024-25, according to the Report Fraud service run by the City of London police, which holds national responsibility for economic crime.
uncertain
which → report → crime
However, the true total may be much higher as many scam victims do not report the crime, often because they feel embarrassed, and sometimes because the individual amount of money involved was relatively small.
uncertain
amount → report → money
The Guardian previously featured the case of a music fan whose Instagram account was targeted by hackers, who used her identity to advertise tickets to an Oasis gig and stole £1,400 from her friends.
asserted
who → feature → friends
She said the hackers impersonated her so well that her friends and family genuinely thought they were speaking to her.
asserted
they → say → her
Others have been scammed by fraudulent WhatsApp and text messages in which a criminal pretends to be their child or a relative who is in an emergency situation and urgently needs cash.
asserted
who → scamme → cash
This has been dubbed the “Hi mum” scam.
asserted
This → dub → ?
Data from Santander has shown that among customers of the bank, fraudsters pretending to be someone’s son were the most successful at extracting cash, followed by daughters.
asserted
fraudsters → show → daughters
Ch Supt Amanda Wolf, head of Report Fraud operations, said: “For most people, being hacked isn’t just a cyber issue – it’s personal.
asserted
it → say → people
It can leave victims locked out of important accounts, worried about what information has been accessed, and concerned that criminals may use their identity to target others.”
uncertain
criminals → leave → others
She added that what starts with one compromised account “can quickly impact family, friends and colleagues as fraudsters exploit trusted relationships to commit further fraud”.
asserted
fraudsters → add → fraud
Report Fraud is launching an awareness campaign urging the public to protect their online accounts from hackers by switching to passkeys where they are available.
asserted
they → launch → passkeys
A passkey uses an individual’s device and biometrics to authenticate them and cannot be hacked like a password.
asserted
passkey → use → password
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