Joint Fraud Taskforce board minutes: 21 November 2022
Updated 14 February 2023
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Welcomes
The Security Minister opened the Joint Fraud Taskforce and welcomed Parliamentary Secretary for the Treasury Baroness Penn and the Minister for Tech and Digital Security Paul Scully MP to the meeting.
Sector charters
The Security Minister gave a high-level update and thanked members on delivery of outstanding actions.
UK Finance updated on the retail banking charter and the completion of the victims’ checklist to support victims of banking fraud to improve consistency in messaging and signposting.
The National Economic Crime Centre (NECC) led the Accountancy Charter update and confirmed that the National Assessment Centre report (Fraud in the Accountancy Sector intelligence brief) has now been completed and that work is now progressing quickly on other actions, such as the fraud awareness toolkit.
The Communications Crime Steering Group (CCSG) updated on the implementation of SMS filters and updated that all customers in the UK should be migrated onto the spam shield by mid-December. The sector is also working to implement Ofcom’s guidance on detecting and blocking calls falsely showing as being from UK phone numbers (to tackle spoofing).
Fraud strategy
Home Office officials gave an update on the fraud strategy, including an overview of the new structure and content.
Members welcomed progress and Cifas noted we should include recommendations from recent select committee reports on fraud.
Members highlighted the need to put consumers at the heart of the strategy because of the cost-of-living pressures, and as part of this we should continue to deliver work on victim reimbursement.
There was general agreement that there should be a continued effort to improve the consistency of fraud communications to better inform the public and saturate the messaging into the public consciousness, but we should be aware of placing too much of a burden on victims to protect themselves.
There were discussions around the merits of national campaigns compared to sector specific efforts. Members commented that national campaigns have the benefit of creating a trusted source for information.
The NECC commented that they are in the process of identifying the key messages we need to land so they can share coherent messaging with industry to improve the fraud communications landscape.
The Security Minister encouraged members to write to him with their views on how we should proceed with comms messaging.
Impact measurement
Home Office officials presented proposals for measuring industry impact on fraud reduction.
All sectors agreed with Home Office proposal to set a baseline. However, members noted the need for a credible estimate of fraud which would help show where industry and others should be investing resource.
Members stated they already have data available which can be shared and provide a starting point for the work.
The Security Minister asked industry to provide data they have on fraud as a requisite for HO to take action and a follow up meeting with tech, telecommunications and finance was proposed.
Closing remarks
The Security minister closed the meeting and commented he is grateful for the continued support of members.