Moment Kochie explodes on Sunrise over scams using his name and face

David Koch has slammed scammers who have used his image and “dodgy quotes” to rob Australians of thousands of dollars.

Mr Koch was speaking to Assistant Treasurer Stephen Jones about what the federal government was doing to protect Australians from being targeted by scammers on social media, when he revealed that one viewer had tens of thousands of dollars stolen.

“I had a bloke on the weekend contact me through Facebook, abusing me because he had lost $30,000 on a scam that used my picture and dodgy comments from me,” he said.

“Scammers have been using my photo and dodgy quotes from me to scam people for years,” he said on Monday morning.

“They appear on Facebook, they appear on LinkedIn, they appear on that Taboola feed on big mainstream websites and I can’t do anything about it.”

Mr Koch then demanded the Assistant Treasurer answer why social media giants are not scrutinised as heavily as mainstream media platforms are.

“Here at Channel 7, we get sued by you and the ACCC if we run a dodgy ad,” he said.

“Why can’t Facebook and Instagram and LinkedIn take the same responsibilities as mainstream media groups?

“It’s just heartbreaking for our viewers that get sucked in by these sorts of things.”

The government isn’t able to act on these sorts of scams because Australian laws are lagging behind, Mr Jones said.

Mr Jones then announced a new “anti-scam centre” being set up by the Australian Competition and Consumer Commission (ACCC).

“Once we detect something in motion, (it’s about) locking it down as soon as possible and getting onto the social media platforms as you suggested, and ensuring that they (the centre) have a legal obligation to shut these things down at the source,” he said.

“Yes, the social media platforms are a part of it, the telecommunications companies are part of it, because a lot of it is happening through email and SMS as well, but we want to ensure that at every point in the process, there is a government strategy directed at it to ensure that Australians aren’t being ripped off to the tune of $4 billion a year.”