RSA 2021:

Who Would Fall For That?

A community-led scam reporting app and Gen Z targeted social media campaign, designed to work side by side targeting all age groups, ultimately creating an awareness that anyone can fall victim to a scam.

Stereotypically, people believe that scammers target elderly, vulnerable people. This stereotype is not helped by the digital generational divide which is rapidly increasing due to the significant lack of support and education available for less digitally able people in our society. However, in the last couple of years there has been a steep increase in younger people falling victim to online scams. Currently, the cost of fraud to the UK is between £130bn - £190bn a year.

The social media campaign is designed for Instagram and primarily aims to target Gen Z, as research shows this generation believes they are least likely to fall for a scam. The Instagram grid hosts a series of carousel posts, stories and individual posts that have been designed to engage the younger generation. A set of gifs have been designed to represent the harsh and non-discriminatory nature of scammer action, which are used across the campaign, and the app. They are focused on things that are taken from people: love, hope, time, money, trust. Using a variety of pronouns, different situations and scam types allows the content to be relatable to anyone.

The app is designed to be a sleek, easy to use tool for community discussion and support in relation to online scam and fraud. Users can alert others of potential scams as well as read of other’s experiences to feel less alone, embarrassed and isolated. The aim is to spread awareness and through this, decreasing the number of scam victims. A key aspect I wanted to target within this campaign and app concept was to remove the element of shame that historically comes hand in hand with being scammed. As the app is community led, it creates a sense of togetherness and safety. 

The structure is simple with only 4 main categories for user ease. Users have the ability to write, post and share about their scam experience, as well as read about other people’s encounters in order to create awareness of most common scams. With external links to sites such as Action Fraud (the UK’s national reporting centre for fraud and cybercrime) located within the “Report A Scam” section of the app, accessibility to all necessary sites are right at your fingertips.