Trading Standards eCrime

  • National Trading Standards outlines emerging threats in annual Consumer Harm Report
  • £345m in businesses and consumer detriment prevented in the past two years

The UK public and small businesses are today being urged to start making every day safer as the latest online crime figures from ourselves at Get Safe Online and the National Fraud Intelligence Bureau (NFIB) reveal that a staggering £10.9 billion* was lost to the UK economy as a result of fraud, including cybercrime, in 2015/16. That equates to approximately £210 per person over the age of 16 living in the UK**, but represents only reported fraud and cybercrime to Action Fraud.

Free trial scams are now spreading on social media into many other product areas, and consumers are still losing money to this scam.
The National Trading Standards eCrime Team, along with Get Safe Online is supporting the second week of Citizens Advice’s Scams Awareness Month 2016 with an infographic aimed at highlighting the problem of ‘free trial’ scams, also known as subscription traps.

Biggest and longest enforcement action against counterfeiting and piracy on social media rolled out across Scotland and Eire
Operation Jasper extended its reach into Eire in June and begins operating in Scotland this July as officers from Trading Standards and the Police in England, Wales, and Northern Ireland are joined by their Scottish and Irish equivalents in the fight against social media counterfeiting. The move is part of the latest phase of Operation Jasper, which was launched in May 2015 to tackle counterfeiting and piracy on social media.

Biggest and longest enforcement action against counterfeiting and piracy on social media rolled out across Scotland and Eire
Operation Jasper extended its reach into Eire in June and begins operating in Scotland this July as officers from Trading Standards and the Police in England, Wales, and Northern Ireland are joined by their Scottish and Irish equivalents in the fight against social media counterfeiting. The move is part of the latest phase of Operation Jasper, which was launched in May 2015 to tackle counterfeiting and piracy on social media.

Worrying new research suggests that many jobseekers are having trouble spotting the signs of a job scam.
The research conducted by CV-Library in partnership with SAFERJobs comes from a survey of 2,000 UK workers and aimed to discover what they knew about online job scams. The results reveal a worrying lack of awareness and understanding among jobseekers:

With online crime becoming an increasing threat for businesses, new figures from Get Safe Online and Action Fraud (1) released today show that from March 2015 – March 2016, a huge total of £1,079,447,765 was reported lost by businesses to online crime. This comes as Action Fraud saw a 22% increase from 30,475 in 2014 – 2015, to 37,070 crimes reported in the last year. 

With online crime becoming an increasing threat for businesses, new figures from Get Safe Online and Action Fraud (1) released today show that from March 2015 – March 2016, a huge total of £1,079,447,765 was reported lost by businesses to online crime. This comes as Action Fraud saw a 22% increase from 30,475 in 2014 – 2015, to 37,070 crimes reported in the last year. 

People desperate to attend major pop concerts, music festivals and sporting events this summer face a greater risk of falling victim to criminals after online ticket fraud soared by 55 per cent.
More than £5 million was lost to online ticket fraud in the UK in 2015 – up from £3.35 million in 2014 – with social media sites now accounting for nearly half of all reported ticket scams. On average, customers who bought fake tickets lost £444 per transaction.