Scamfighter of the Year 2020

Derek Smythe

In 2003, Derek created ‘Artists Against 419’ (AA419) – an online community dedicated to identifying and shutting down 419 scam websites. Its volunteers seek to stop, disrupt or hinder fraudsters' activities by cataloguing and reporting fraudulent domains.

Julie Wilson

Julie was Scamadviser's first Scamfighter. She runs the Facebook page ‘Scam Alert Global’ that has more than 15,000 followers and is dedicated to exposing all kinds of online scams. In the last year, she reported more than 300 websites and helped countless victims cope with the trauma of falling for a scam.

Vince Donovan

Vince Donovan served 30 years as a police officer with South Wales police. Over the past 18 years, Vince has delivered training to over 350 organisations throughout England and Wales. His organization Safety Solutions Training also provides training to help avoid scams.

Philippe A.

Since 2008, Philippe has volunteered on various sites and forums to fight against scams on the Internet. In 2018, Philippe created the website Agir Solutions to help individuals and professionals better protect themselves on the Internet.

James Greening

James has been actively fighting online scams through his website Fake Website Buster and actively works with Scamadviser to report scams. He has written more than 200 reviews and compiled lists of thousands of scammy websites. His in-depth reviews cover Shopping, Investment, Employment and other scams.

Chuck Whitlock

Chuck Whitlock has written 18 books on white-collar crime published by Simon & Schuster and other mainstream publishers.

His national television segments have been viewed on OPRAH, 60 Minutes, EXTRA, 20th Century, CNN and hundreds of other shows including The View with Barbara Walters, by over two billion people throughout the world. He was the driving force behind the USPS national mail fraud and phone fraud education program with President Bill Clinton. Chuck won the national” Headliners Television Broadcast Award”, many Journalism Awards, the prestigious National Attorneys General Award for the best fraud prevention television segment on Medicare Fraud.

Chuck continues to dedicate his life to fighting fraud and the people who perpetrate it. He served as the Chairman of the FBI Citizens Academy in Oregon and as communications Committee Chair for the national FBI Citizens Academy. He continues to provide fraud prevention keynote speeches worldwide and is booked years in advance.

Finally, Chuck partnered with EXPERIAN to create the most comprehensive law enforcement training on fraud in the United States, Every police officer in several states have to take his senior fraud and street scam training. Edward Jones, Merrill Lynch and other brokerage firms and Bank Associations hire Chuck to teach their employees how to identify internal fraud.

Kitboga

Kitboga is a prominent Twitch streamer and YouTuber with over 1.45 Million subscribers whose content primarily focuses on scambaiting. He engages in baiting several types of scammers including tech support scammers, refund scammers, IRS scammers, and others.

Peter Depuydt

For 5 years, Peter has been the Senior Specialist and Team leader of Europol's Analysis Project APATE. He has been a key player in developing international cooperation with non-European countries and enhancing public-private partnership. He is a real expert in the field of fighting scams.

Abhishek Dahal

Investigating Officer Abhishek Dahal has led multiple cybercrime busts in the past year in Sikkim, India. Dahal’s team has made arrests for various crimes including online disinformation campaigns using fake social media accounts and fake job rackets.

Page Admin - Sponsored Ads Exposed

The admin of the Facebook page ‘Sponsored Ads Exposed’ has been working diligently to expose the glut of scam ads on Facebook. Since launching in November, the page now has over 400 followers and over 220 pieces of evidence (and growing).

Sarah Stacey

As the page admin of What I Bought vs What I Got, Sarah has been exposing online shopping scams since 2019. She has spearheaded the compilation of 'the list' of thousands of websites that have been known to pull scams such as bait-and-switch and non-delivery. 

React

React is a not-for-profit organization with over 30 years experience and has in excess of 300 business members covering all sectors of industry. React consists in fact of two pillars: React Operational: supporting members in their anti-counterfeiting strategies by providing customs – online – and market enforcement services at non-commercial fees, and the React Foundation: to support activities to protect all rights holders, consumers and governments against the negative consequences of the trade in counterfeited goods.

BrandShield

BrandShield’s robust technology scans the internet, analyzes potential threats and detects phishing threats, online brand abuse, TM infringements and counterfeit sales. Their experienced and skilled takedown experts remove those threats relentlessly.

iQ Abuse Manager

iQ Abuse Manager (formerly RegistryOffice Abuse Monitor) is an abuse management service that offers access to curated abuse feeds from the world's leading sources together with an API and management system, which makes handling abuse cases as efficient as possible.

Anti-Phishing Working Group (APWG)

APWG is the international coalition unifying the global response to cybercrime across industry, government and law-enforcement sectors and NGO communities. APWG’s membership of more than 2200 institutions worldwide is as global as its outlook, with its directors, managers and research fellows advising national governments and global governance bodies.

Global Cyber Alliance

The Global Cyber Alliance (GCA) is an international, cross-sector effort dedicated to reducing cyber risk and improving our connected world. On September 16, 2015 the Global Cyber Alliance was formed to address systemic cyber risk through a proactive risk-based, solution-oriented approach to address and eradicate malicious cyber risks.

Scamwatch Australia

Scamwatch is run by the Australian Competition and Consumer Commission (ACCC). It provides information to consumers and small businesses about how to recognise, avoid and report scams. The ACCC works with state and territory consumer protection agencies and other government agencies to promote awareness in the community about scams.

Federal Trade Commission (FTC)

The FTC pursues vigorous and effective law enforcement; advances consumers’ interests by sharing its expertise with federal and state legislatures and U.S. and international government agencies; develops policy and research tools through hearings, workshops, and conferences; and creates practical and plain-language educational programs for consumers and businesses in a global marketplace with constantly changing technologies.

Internet Crime Complaint Center (IC3)

The mission of the Internet Crime Complaint Center (IC3) is to provide the public with a reliable and convenient reporting mechanism to submit information to the Federal Bureau of Investigation concerning suspected Internet-facilitated criminal activity and to develop effective alliances with industry partners. Information is processed for investigative and intelligence purposes for law enforcement and public awareness.

Action Fraud UK

Action Fraud is the UK’s national reporting centre for fraud and cybercrime. The service is run by the City of London Police working alongside the National Fraud Intelligence Bureau (NFIB) who are responsible for assessment of the reports and to ensure that your fraud reports reach the right place.

Cybercrime Support Network (CSN)

The Cybercrime Support Network (CSN) is a public-private, nonprofit collaboration created to be the voice of cybercrime victims. CSN is the first organization to connect victims to resources, increase crime reporting, and address the lack of information available to law enforcement and industry with a national reporting structure.

ScamAlert Singapore

The National Crime Prevention Council (NCPC) is a non-profit organisation committed to promoting public awareness and concern about crime and to propagate the concept of self-help in crime prevention. The Council comprises representatives from the commercial and industrial sectors, as well as from the public sector and the Singapore Police Force (SPF).