Month: September 2014

Fraudulent insurance claims running at 500 a day

Many Britons appear to take the view that honesty is not the best policy when it comes to taking out car insurance. Industry figures showed firms are uncovering almost 3,500 fraudulent applications each week. The Association of British Insurers (ABI) revealed that in 2013, UK insurers detected 180,675 attempted fraudulent applications for motor insurance – […]

Online banking fraud up 71%

Banks appear to have lost ground to the criminals after figures showed a 71pc rise in online banking fraud, to £29.3m for the first half of the year. It comes despite the rollout of more stringent log-in processes, such as issuing customers with “security keys”, calculators that generate new passwords each time a customer wants […]

Passport Office targeting postcodes for investigation

Officials are using the postal addresses of passport applicants to decide which areas to prioritise for fraud investigations and “additional checking”, the Guardian has learned. A hundred postcode districts have been identified by civil servants as places from which applications for travel documents for children should face extra scrutiny, leaked papers show. Link to article

Police arrest 13 people linked to £2.8m investment scam

The City of London Police have arrested 13 people in relation to a multi-million investment scam. Earlier this morning, a nationwide fraud operation with 120 police officers across England arrested the men on suspicion of defraud and money laundering. The gang behind the alleged fraud is believed to have run four boiler rooms, cold-calling people […]

Rugby World Cup: Criminals plotting to hijack launch

Organised ticket touting gangs stand to make millions illegally from fleecing supporters by ‘flooding the tickets ballot’ on England Rugby 2015’s official website. Organised criminals with links to the arms and drugs trade were on Wednesday night plotting to hijack the Rugby World Cup ticket launch and hold countless ordinary fans to ransom on the […]

Craigslist buyer scams

Just five gangs in Nigeria are behind most Craigslist buyer scams. Five Nigerian criminal gangs are behind most scams targeting sellers on Craigslist, and they’ve taken new measures to make their swindles appear legitimate, according to a new study. In a new innovation, they’re using professional check-writing equipment plus U.S.-based accomplices to not raise suspicions […]

Crackdown on fraudsters ripping off Muslim pilgrims

Consumer watchdogs in Birmingham are spearheading a nationwide probe in a bid to stop fraudsters ripping off Muslim pilgrims. The city council has clinched £100,000 funding from the National Trading Standards Board to set up a taskforce to tackle crooks conning people booking religious Hajj and Umrah pilgrimages to Saudi Arabia. Birmingham Trading Standards is […]