An independent review of the UK’s fraud laws is to be carried out for the first time in nearly 40 years.

Part two of Jonathan Fisher KC’s Independent Review of Disclosure and Fraud Offences marks the first review of fraud legislation since 1986.

During this time, the nature and scale of fraud has evolved considerably, with fraud now accounting for more than 40 per cent of all offences recorded by the Crime Survey for England and Wales.

Where Lord Roskill’s 1986 review focused mostly on the serious fraud committed by corporate entities, the huge increase in fraud offences over the past decade has come at the expense of ordinary consumers and small businesses, targeted by highly organised gangs, many of them based overseas.

The Home Office says the resulting harm to society is severe, with fraud against individuals in England and Wales alone recently estimated to cost more than £6.8 billion every year.

Fraud has also been transformed by the impact of modern technology, with the increasing use of artificial intelligence to create scambots, deepfakes and websites impersonating established businesses and public authorities.

Fraud gangs have the ability to target tens of thousands of Britons every hour through social media, email and telephone, and need to persuade only a small fraction of those individuals to fall for their scams in order to make millions of pounds.

The Home Office will place these emerging threats at the heart of its new, expanded fraud strategy to be published later this year, but it will also be vital to have the independent analysis provided by Jonathan Fisher KC to inform the response required from government, law enforcement and industry. And with international cooperation to disrupt threats a key national security commitment within its Plan for Change, the Government is also building a united global response as part of its strategy to tackle fraud.

Part 2 of the Fisher Review will therefore examine the largest challenges faced by law enforcement in bringing criminals committing fraud offences to justice in England and Wales. Specifically, it will consider issues in various stages of the fraud life cycle, including detection and reporting, disruption, investigation, and prosecution and offences.

https://policeprofessional.com/news/fraud-laws-to-be-reviewed-for-first-time-in-40-years/