Crime study into e-payment fraud reported at joint police and industry conference

13 October 2015

Andrew Charlesworth, Reader in IT & Law at the University of Bristol Law School, reported findings from a six-month study he undertook on the increasing threat cybercrime poses to the UK’s payment industry. The research, which formed part of a wider two-year EU-funded Skynet project, were disseminated to police officers from national and international agencies, and members of the payments industry, at a conference in London.

The Skynet study focused specifically on the area of remote payments which are responsible for 66 per cent of the £450m fraud losses on UK cards in 2013. It was designed to provide background for future Skynet work, providing recommendations on strategic directions, stakeholder engagement and co-ordination, police training, and intelligence capture and dissemination within law enforcement agencies.

The report aims to ensure regulation, legislation, training and action by law enforcement, industry and consumers is aligned and focused on areas which will achieve the best prevention, detection and enforcement outcomes.

Andrew worked with the Dedicated Card and Payment Crime Unit (DCPCU), a special police unit with officers drawn from the City of London Police and the Metropolitan Police Service, Financial Fraud Action UK (FFA UK) - the body responsible for the collective fight against financial fraud on behalf of the UK payments industry also with the support of Europol’s European Cyber Crime Centre (EC3). Project Skynet also involves partners in law enforcement from Belgium, Finland, Hungary and Romania and follows the success of Project Sandpiper, the DCPCU-led European Commission funded project targeting Romanian Organised Crime Groups impacting on the UK, widely reported in the media.