The typical scam in Brazil costs less than R$300. The MED exists for that victim

The Global Anti-Scam Alliance (GASA), a nonprofit that brings together governments, banks, platforms and security companies, published "The State of Scams Brazil 2026" in August. The headline figure is large: Brazilian adults lost R$21.24 billion to scams over the past year, some 16.5 million people lost money, and the country is estimated to have seen 34.5 billion scam attempts.

Those aggregate numbers come from an extrapolation. The survey polled 1,170 adults between March 16 and April 13, 2026, through an online panel, weighted to represent the adult population by age, gender and region. Of those, 113 said they had lost money to a scam. The report multiplies the share of victims by the adult population, and the average loss by the estimated number of victims. The totals work as an order of magnitude, not as a count.

The figure that got the least attention is the most useful one.

The mean and the median

The average loss per victim, in the report, is R$1,287.20. The median — the value that splits victims down the middle — is R$295.90. The most frequent loss falls between R$266.70 and R$322.40.

The gap between those two numbers tells you how the damage is distributed. Half of victims lost less than R$300. The mean is pulled upward because a smaller group lost far more; the report records a standard deviation of R$3,016. The R$21 billion is built, above all, from a great many people losing a little.

It is a different picture from the scam that tends to make the news, the one where someone loses their savings on a fake investment platform. That scam is real, and it weighs on the average. But the typical scam is the purchase that never arrived, the fake support agent, the Pix sent to someone who promised a product — and it costs about as much as an electricity bill.

For a loss that size, there is almost no other route

A R$300 loss does not justify a lawsuit, a forensic examination or a private investigation. The cost of any of those exceeds the amount at stake. For this victim, the available instrument is the one the payment system itself provides: with Pix, the Mecanismo Especial de Devolução (MED), triggered inside the banking app, free of charge and without a police report.

And the MED depends on speed. It freezes whatever it finds in the recipient's account and returns what it finds, not what the victim lost. The GASA report shows how much time victims typically have: in one out of every four scams involving financial loss, the whole thing unfolded within minutes; in 42%, within a day of the scammer's first contact.

The payment method confirms where the fight is. Among Brazilians who lost money, 54% paid through some form of immediate transfer — a category in which the report groups instant payment apps such as Pix, digital wallets, gift cards and cryptocurrency exchanges.

What happens when the victim reports it

Among those who lost money, the bank or payment provider was the most cited reporting channel, at 42%. Police came next, at 30%. Across all authorities combined, 38% of victims with a financial loss reported it to some public body.

The outcome is the weakest point in the report. Among those who reported to some organization, 20% said they had recovered or been reimbursed at least part of the money. Another 36% said the organization took no action at all, as far as they knew.

A caveat on sample size is warranted here: this question was answered by 85 people. The figure indicates a tendency; it does not measure the system. Nor does it distinguish a report filed within minutes from one filed days later — which is precisely what matters most for the MED.

Even so, the pattern is consistent with what the Banco Central's rules allow us to expect. The MED has no fund to cover losses: when the recipient's account is empty, no bank is required to reimburse the victim out of its own pocket, except where the bank itself erred in the procedure. We explain here which MED deadline weighs most in the victim's favor.

People who have been scammed tend to be scammed again

One in three Brazilians who lost money to a scam in the past year says it happened more than once. On average, those who lost money did so 1.7 times over the period. Anyone who falls for one scam lands on the radar of whoever runs the next, and one of the types the report lists is precisely the operator who promises to recover the money already lost. Here's how the recovery scam works.

What to do when R$300 is on the line

• Dispute it in the banking app, immediately. Filing a MED request is free and does not require a police report. In a scam that plays out in minutes, the difference between disputing now and disputing tomorrow may be whether the recipient's account still has a balance.
• Keep the case number and track the status of the request in the app. If it is rejected or canceled, ask for the reason in writing.
• File a police report even if the amount seems small. Low-value scams are rarely isolated: operators tend to run the same script on many people, and it is the accumulation of reports that gives an investigation scale.
• Be suspicious of anyone who approaches you offering to recover your money for a fee.

In one line

Half of all scam victims in Brazil lost less than R$300, an amount no lawsuit can justify. For that victim, the route is to dispute the Pix in the banking app within the first few minutes — and to file a police report anyway.

Been scammed, or nearly scammed? Report the case. A report won't recover your money, but it helps map who is running the scam and warns whoever comes next.

Sources

• Global Anti-Scam Alliance (GASA) — The State of Scams Brazil 2026, summary version (August 2026; PDF hosted by Poder360), methodology, cost of scams and reporting sections.
• Banco Central do Brasil — Implementation guide for Pix refund procedures, with emphasis on the Mecanismo Especial de Devolução, version 4.4
• CyberX — The MED didn't get your money back, On the MED clock, the only deadline that releases the money belongs to the victim's bank and The recovery scam