Fraudulent insurance claims rose to an all-time high last year on a sharp increase in cases involving minor fraud cases, the financial regulator said Wednesday.

Insurance scammers took a record 1.12 trillion won (US$838.6 million) through wrongful filings in 2023, up 34.6 billion won, or 3.2 percent, from a year earlier, according to the Financial Supervisory Service.

The number of suspects involved climbed 6.7 percent on-year to 109,522.

Fraud involving nonlife insurance accounted for 96.1 percent of false claims, up from 94.6 percent in 2022, while the ratio of cases involving life insurance slipped to 3.9 percent from 5.4 percent over the cited period.

The financial regulator said it will further step up efforts to expose fraudulent insurance claims in cooperation with other related agencies, including the police.

Source: Yonhap News Agency