Fraud increases by 10% in UK

Cases of fraud in the UK increased by 10 per cent in the first half of this year compared to the previous six months, according to new figures from fraud prevention service Cifas.

Of the 111,504 cases reported, identity fraud made up almost half of the crimes, with a further 10 per cent of cases involving the illegal hijacking of a victim’s bank account.

CIFAS said cases involving the misuse of an account or facility have risen to their highest levels since 2009 and now account for a quarter of all fraud crimes. Bank accounts linked to a plastic card such as a credit, debit or store card tend to be targeted most frequently, making up 38 per cent of all cases.

“Someone’s personal and financial details are like a licence to print money for the modern fraudster,” said Richard Hurley from CIFAS. “Whether they were obtained digitally or physically, the fact that over a half of all frauds in some way relate to the misuse of other people’s personal details clearly underlines the severity of this threat.”

He said checks by public sector organisations for passports, driving licences, benefits and tax credits should also be made against this data to prevent misuse of documents.

In its latest report, Fraudscape Bulletin , Cifas said frauds relating to the process of paying in false of altered cheques that subsequently bounce or fraudulent electronic payments represent more than one in two of all misuse of facility frauds.

Another product targeted by fraudsters is the mortgage. In the first six months of 2011, the most common reasons for a mortgage fraud being recorded included the failure to disclose a previous address in an attempt to hide an adverse credit history, false proof of income and false employment details.

Meanwhile, the latest Fraud Index from Experian, the global information services company, also revealed a sharp increase in fraudulent attempts to open current accounts in the UK during the first three months of 2011.

Nick Mothershaw, director of fraud & identity solutions at Experian, said: “As increasingly sophisticated identity verification and fraud prevention technologies have made life more difficult for fraudsters, some have turned their attentions to current accounts, believing them to be a softer target to then launch attacks on more lucrative credit card and mortgage products.”