Scams

Two people selling faked Cornishware pottery have received suspended sentences and ordered to pay £80,000.

A change to EU law, requiring auction houses, dealers and agents in art and antiques to carry out checks on transactions and customers, will come into force in January 2020 – regardless of Brexit.

A police appeal has been launched for the recovery of two Frank Auerbach (b.1931) paintings as part of a fraud investigation.

The cost to firms of cyber fraudsters' invoice scams reached nearly £100m in 2018 and small businesses, such as those in the art and antiques trade, remain vulnerable, according to the latest report.

The insurance industry has again warned the art and antiques trade to be alert to a scam from fraudsters targeting galleries and dealers via emailed invoices.

An art dealer has been jailed for the theft of £500,000 worth of paintings.

An insurance firm has sounded a warning about cyber fraudsters who appear to be targeting dealers and auctioneers with an invoice scam.

Dealers are again being targeted by scam guides that seek to extort large sums of money in return for inclusion in worthless trade listings.

An American businessman has been charged in a New York court accused of applying improper valuations to items sold from his art and antiques collection.

An art dealer from Cornwall has been sentenced after pleading guilty to seven counts of fraud relating to the sale of fake paintings, including works he claimed were by Alfred Wallis (1855-1942).

Mayfair art agent Timothy Sammons is facing a string of legal claims over soured multi-million-pound deals in the United Kingdom and the United States involving paintings by Van Gogh, Canaletto, Picasso, Chagall, Modigliani and Magritte.

Art dealer David Carter has admitted intentionally selling fake paintings purporting to be by well-known Cornish artists. He has pleaded guilty to seven counts of fraud at Truro crown court and may face jail.

Two of the three people sentenced for their role in the Cameo auction house fraud have lodged appeals against their convictions.