Representatives from across the private sector met at 10 Downing
Street to update government on progress made to tackle fraud and
protect the public from scams.
The Security Minister, , convened a meeting of the Joint Fraud Taskforce
(JFT) to drive forward delivery of the commitments made in the
Fraud
Strategy, published earlier this year. With several actions
already implemented, members of the group agreed to use the forum
to continue to monitor progress.
Representatives discussed the development of an online fraud
charter with the tech sector to respond to the growing volume of
fraud originating on social media platforms. The charter
will ensure that tech firms take action to block scams, make it
easier to report frauds and ensure that fraudulent content is
removed swiftly. The Security Minister has also called on tech
firms to implement stronger measures to tackle fraud on their
platforms ahead of the introduction of the Online Safety Bill.
Anti-Fraud Champion said:
Collaboration with industry is key to blocking fraud at source.
Since stepping into my role, I’ve worked at pace with industry to
ensure we are delivering on our commitment to cut off the
channels fraudsters use to target us and protect people’s hard
earned money.
I will continue this conversation with tech sector bosses to
ensure they are doing everything in their power to disrupt the
callous fraudsters operating online and better protect their
users.
Previous Joint Fraud Taskforce meetings have overseen the
development and agreement of charters covering sectors such
as retail banking and telecoms. The telecommunications charter
has already resulted in massive action by the operators, with
over 600 million scam texts blocked and vast numbers of scam
calls filtered out before they can reach the public.
Representatives also discussed the development of a
cross-government anti-fraud public awareness campaign to
streamline and simplify messaging to the public. The Security
Minister encouraged partners to collaborate with government on
the preparation and delivery of the campaign.
Today’s meeting is the first since the publication of the
government’s Fraud Strategy which set out a whole system response
to tackling these crimes in the light of how they have evolved
through modern technology.
This included the creation of a new National Fraud Squad to
overhaul how these crimes are investigated by taking a proactive,
intelligence-led approach, backed by 400 new specialist
investigators, working with local forces, international partners
and the UK intelligence community to shut down fraud cells.
Other measures in the strategy include:
- banning cold calls on all financial products such as types of
insurance or sham crypto currency schemes
- working with Ofcom to use new technology to further clamp
down on number ‘spoofing’, so fraudsters cannot impersonate
legitimate UK phone numbers
- banning the use of so-called ‘SIM farms’ commonly harnessed
by scammers to reach thousands of people at once
- reviewing the use of mass texting services
- rolling out tailored support to victims at a local level
across the whole of England and Wales through the National
Economic Crime Victim Care Unit
- launching an independent review of the challenges in
investigating and prosecuting fraud to speed up the justice
process, punishing more scammers and ensuring sentences match the
severity of the impact on victims
- deploying the UK intelligence community to identify and
disrupt more fraudsters overseas
- publishing regular data on the volume of fraudulent content
hosted on different websites and platforms to incentivise
companies to root these out and better protect users.
Organisations in attendance at the JFT included:
- HM Treasury
- National Cyber Security Centre
- National Economic Crime Centre (NECC)
- City of London Police
- National Trading Standards
- UK Finance
- Cifas
- OFCOM
- Institute of Chartered Accountants in England and Wales
- Victim Support
- Financial Conduct Authority (FCA)
- Law Society of England and Wales
- Association of British Insurers (ABI)
- TechUK
- Google
- Communications Crime Strategy Group (CCSG)
- Serious Fraud Office
- Welsh Government
- Department of Justice Northern Ireland
