New data show Canadians lost hundreds of millions of dollars in the first half of 2025 as impersonation fraud incidents continue to rise across the country.
Canada is facing an accelerating impersonation-fraud crisis. Canadians lost an estimated $638 million to fraud in 2024 and more than $340 million in the first half of 2025 alone. The most alarming increase has been in impersonation-type offences, which have surged by more than three hundred percent over the past year.
Scammers are using increasingly sophisticated methods, including AI-generated voices, spoofed caller IDs, and fake government or corporate identities, to convince victims to transfer money or share sensitive information. One recent warning from the Canadian Anti-Fraud Centre highlighted a new tactic in which criminals pose as fraud investigators claiming to assist with past scams. Victims are told to provide personal details or payments as part of a supposed recovery process.
Experts say the combination of deepfake technology, public trust in familiar institutions, and a growing reliance on digital communication has made impersonation fraud one of the fastest-growing threats in Canada. With many incidents still going unreported, the real losses are believed to be far higher than official figures suggest.
