Over the past few years, there have been an alarming number of incidents related to fraud across the UK. In a recent report published by the Office for National Statistics (ONS), estimated fraud figures were released for the first time, in response to an increasing public demand for more information.
Last year alone saw more than 5 million instances of fraudulent activity occur across the UK. A further 2.5 million incidents were linked to cyber-crime offences, involving computer hacking and harmful malware infecting devices. The recent statistics offer a fresh perspective on this newly-appearing wave of criminal activity.
Fraud has previously gone under the mainstream radar in the UK, with past crime surveys not designed to cover such areas. The National Fraud Intelligence Bureau claims to have seen around 600,000 cases of fraud reported in the last year. However, with an alarming number of new figures cropping up across the media, including the recent hack of TalkTalk, the true scale of fraud may be far more worrying than suggested.
Unsurprisingly, the wake of fraud for individuals and businesses across the UK and Europe has prompted financial institutions to sit up and take note. Banks are now beginning to work alongside police and government forces to try and tackle the problem of fraud, by educating individuals on the growing threat fraudsters pose, as well as enforcing protection techniques.
According to the FFA UK, there were around 1.3million instances of fraud on cards and bank accounts in the UK in the year ending June 2015. Typically, the offences involved Card-Not-Present (CNP) fraud – the norm for online shoppers. With booming ecommerce across Britain, the latest figures reveal that 79% of UK individuals made a purchase online in 2014 and fraudsters are picking up on these trends, by turning away from bricks-and-mortar and going after online retailers.
Both the surge in CNP fraud, and usability shifts from across the pond US adopts EMV, mean that fraud managers are now having to work harder to keep their customers safe. Implementing the right prevention technologies now will help save businesses from financial losses in the future and burst the fraud boom bubble.
