National banks are demanding that social media companies do more to combat fraud after finding that scams hitting people in the Netherlands rose almost 20% in 2025, to nearly €26 million.
Around 70% of online fraud starts on social media, the banking association NVB said on Tuesday, calling on Meta, TikTok and Google to do more to prevent it. “Without the help of big tech and social media companies, further combating online fraud remains a losing battle,” chair Medy van der Laan said.
Bank helpdesk fraud – in which a caller poses as a bank employee and persuades the victim to move money to a “safe” account – accounted for €25.8 million of the total, up €3 million on the year.
Phishing losses rose by €1.8 million to nearly €2.6 million. The number of helpdesk fraud victims fell 14% to just under 5,900, which the banks attribute to lower daily transfer limits and new ways for customers to check whether a caller really is from their bank.
Spotlight on Meta
Van der Laan pointed to a recent finding by Britain’s financial regulator that more than 1,000 illegal advertisements circulated on Meta platforms – Facebook, Instagram and WhatsApp – in a single week. Police said separately that half of all webshop fraud reports they investigate originate on Meta platforms.
Marco Doeland, head of security at the NVB, told the Financieele Dagblad that the platforms were structurally absent from anti-fraud working groups that include the police, telecoms operators and consumer organisations.
Meta said it took down 159 million fraudulent advertisements and 10.9 million criminal accounts in 2025 and pointed to a national working group it sits on alongside the justice ministry, banks and the consumer hotline Fraudehelpdesk.
TikTok said it removes 97.7% of illegal content before any user reports it. Google did not respond to the FD.
What’s behind it
Bank helpdesk fraud peaked in 2022 at over €50 million and has since been roughly halved by tighter transfer limits and customer-awareness campaigns. The banks reimbursed slightly more than 45% of helpdesk fraud losses in 2025 as a goodwill payment.
The renewed appeal to the platform comes days after major data leaks at telecoms firm Odido (6.2 million customers) and cosmetics chain Rituals. Stolen contact details and, in Odido’s case, bank-account numbers are exactly the raw material that feeds social-media scams. Banks recoup fraud costs through higher account fees, which rose more than 10% last year.
