An Australian-founded artificial intelligence (AI) company says its undercover bots have consumed 17 years of scammers’ time, posing as potential victims while gathering information that banks, telecommunications providers and government agencies can use to fight fraud.
The goal extends beyond keeping scammers occupied. Agents seek bank account numbers, cryptocurrency wallet addresses, malicious websites and details about organizations being impersonated. Customers receive that information to help identify and disrupt scams.
“Most of the industry works after the fact. Telcos block numbers, but scammers just get new ones. Banks watch transactions, but by then the scammer has already reached the customer,” Brad Joffe, Apate’s co-founder and chief commercial officer, told TechCrunch. “We go to the scammer directly and get the information before anyone gets hurt.”
Turning The Tables
Founded in 2024, Apate grew out of research at Macquarie University in Sydney. Its origin traces to a scam call that founder and CEO Dali Kaafar received during a family picnic.
Kaafar kept the caller talking for 44 minutes, entertaining his children while preventing the scammer from contacting someone else. The experience prompted him to explore whether technology could automate those exchanges and extract useful information.
Apate says it has conducted more than 2.5 million autonomous conversations and collected over 250,000 pieces of intelligence for customers’ fraud-disruption systems. Some conversations lasted up to two hours.
Customers include Commonwealth Bank of Australia and TPG Telecom. Joffe told the publication that TPG had redirected nearly 590,000 calls to Apate’s agents.
Businesses can also direct agents toward specific objectives, such as obtaining payment details. The company’s website says its Apate Insights platform provides alerts, customized reports and analysis of scam tactics, impersonation patterns and emerging campaigns.
Lobby Capital led the funding round, joined by OIF Ventures, Investible, Concept Ventures and Baobab Ventures.
The company plans to use the investment to develop its technology and expand internationally. Co-founder and Chief Product Officer Peter Eckermann will relocate to the United States to lead North American expansion, while the technology and research team will remain in Sydney. Apate also plans a London office.
The approach sometimes draws angry reactions from scammers, which the company treats as evidence its agents are frustrating their targets, Joffe told TechCrunch.
“We track that as a sign of frustration and every swear word gets celebrated by us at Apate. We are probably one of the only businesses in the world that celebrates when people swear at our product.”
