Canada leads the U.K. and other countries in its efforts to
track and investigate Internet fraud, according to a new report
from the Britain's Attorney General's office.
The Attorney General, Lord Goldsmith, criticized the U.K.
authorities for failing to come up with a centralized way for
consumers to report Internet fraud, as has been done in countries
such as the US and Canada. The result is that Internet
fraud -- which accounts for 8 per cent of all fraud in the U.K. --
is growing unchecked, the report said.
"It is often confusing for victims to know who to report the
fraud to, particularly if it crosses geographical or sectoral
boundaries," Goldsmith said in the report. "Fraudsters benefit from
this lack of continuity of response. Internet fraud is a
particularly good example of how a fraud can become difficult to
report."
He used the example of a fraudster, Mr Bogus, who defrauds a
user by advertising products on an Internet auction site,
illustrating how such crimes are often not taken seriously.
"Mr. Bogus remains free to re-advertise the computer and
performs the same fraud on n increasing number of victims. The
police and trading standards do not identify Mr. Bogus as a repeat
offender because the reports of fraud are either not accepted, or
appear in different force areas," Goldsmith wrote in the
report.
He said such crimes have an effect far larger than they appear
because of "externalities" such as the chilling effect on
e-commerce in general. As an example, the 2002/03 British Crime
Survey found that 75 per cent of respondents were worried about the
security of using a credit card online, Goldsmith said.
He urged the creation of an Internet fraud reporting scheme on a
national or E.U. level, along the lines of the U.S.'
Internet Crime Complaints Centre (IC3) or Canada's Reporting Economic Crime Online (RECOL)
centre.
"While no such center exists in the U.K. to tackle fraud, a
national reporting center has recently been launched to tackle
pedophilia and protect children," Goldsmith wrote. "This model
shows that it is possible to establish such operations in the U.K.
and it is feasible to do so."
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