But its clear that the police are struggling to keep pace with fraudsters.
A 2018Which?report found that an estimated 96% of fraud cases reported to Action Fraud go unsolved.
On closer inspection, this form of vigilante justice may actually do more harm than good.
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The most basic form of scambaiting sets out to waste a scammers time.
At a minimum, scambaiters attempt to make scammers answer countless questions or perform pointless and random tasks.
By keeping a scammer busy, scambaiters claim theyre preventing the scammer from defrauding a real victim.
Scambaiting may also be conducted with a specific purpose in mind.
But there are other, less benevolent motives in the scambaiting community.
Hunting trophies
These trophies can be fairly benign.
Some icons are awarded for exceptionally long scambaits, or for securing a photo or video of the scammer.
But other trophies may cause lasting damage to an offenders physical and mental wellbeing.
The yin yang trophy symbol, for example, represents an offender getting a permanent tattoo.
Another more sought-after trophy is the pith helmet.
Scambaiting has also received a recent boost in popularity, with YouTubers likeJim Browningnow promoting their own scambaiting activities.
Scambaiting can also be dangerous, especially for those who are new and inexperienced.
Scammers have previously employed a retribution technique known as swatting in cases where theyve encountered a scambaiter.
In some instances, victims of swattinghave been killed.
Fighting fraud responsibly
So scambaiting appears both controversial and risky.
But voluntary responses to online fraud neednt be this way.
Our research also suggests that state-led initiatives could play a more prominent role in tackling online fraud.
Voluntary initiatives like 419eater have shown theres an appetite from the public to tackle scams.
