Kate Frankish, Pay.UK’s fraud lead, comments on UK Finance 2023 Fraud Report
Kate Frankish, Chief Business Development Officer and Anti-fraud lead at Pay.UK said:
"With the announcement of the government’s Fraud Strategy last week, attention is turning increasingly towards the many regulatory, policy, business and technology elements, which are involved in fighting fraud.
"The UK Finance fraud figures show that while we have made some important progress, there’s a lot more work to be done to protect victims of fraud.
"Fraudsters move fast and adapt quickly, coming up with novel methods and using technology to their advantage. This is reflected in the steep rise of online scams, which are one of the most prevalent crimes in the UK, with impersonation scams, where fraudsters pretend to be a friend, family member or a trusted organisation, being one of the most common methods this year. We are working with the payments industry to develop tools to detect and prevent this type of fraud.
"To tackle this issue, regulators and law enforcement must keep up with new technology and work more closely with online social and technology platforms, telecommunication providers and financial institutions.
"We are seeing the beginnings of better collaboration in government plans to work closely with Ofcom, and in increased business responsibility for fraud prevention outlined in Online Safety Bill drafts. But more needs to be done.
"The role of policy, regulators and policing remains critically important. But to get the best results we need businesses and technology platforms to work more closely with government institutions and be proactive in finding ways to spot and eliminate crime before it happens.”