By Stefan Boscia
The UK needs a more streamlined way to combat fraud instead of relying on the “alphabet soup” of agencies that currently operate, Baroness Nicky Morgan has said.
Morgan, a former digital and culture secretary, said the UK is a “world leader” in digital fraud and that there are “far too many agencies and regulators and bodies” involved in monitoring it.
The House of Lords’ Fraud Act 2006 and Digital Fraud Committee, which Morgan chairs, released a 190-page report into fraud on Saturday.
It found that the UK justice system was ill equipped to fight fraud, making the country a “lucrative market” for scammers from overseas.
The report said law enforcement agencies are “chronically underfunded for the fight” and that “only a paltry 1 per cent of law enforcement is focused on tackling economic crime”.
Fraud is the most commonly experienced crime in Britain, with scammers taking more than £1bn each year.
Morgan told Times Radio today: “We know that if there are lots of different bodies, that ultimately, you know, responsibility can be transferred or deflected to somebody else.
“You’ve got to have a mechanism whereby all those different bodies cannot, they’ve got to come together, they got to be tasked by the Prime Minister, the Home Secretary downwards, this is a problem, you have got to work together to solve it.”
She also called for a “cabinet subcommittee on the topic of fraud” that would be chaired by security minister Tom Tugendhat.
Tugendhat said in the Fraud Act 2006 and Digital Fraud Committee report that the UK is “one of the very few jurisdictions in the world that allows for pretty much instantaneous transfers” of money.
He said this means “you can defraud somebody quickly and therefore have access to the cash immediately” and then “pass it on to 20 or 30 other bank accounts”.
The government’s Online Safety Bill, currently going through parliament, will force social media companies and search engines “to prevent paid-for fraudulent adverts appearing on their services”.
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