Telecommunications Fraud: Reimbursement of Victims

Lord Vaux of Harrowden Excerpts

Wednesday 14th May 2025 Lords Chamber

Asked by

[Lord Vaux of Harrowden]

To ask His Majesty’s Government what steps they intend to take to ensure that technology and telecommunication firms contribute to the cost of fraud prevention and the reimbursement of victims of fraud that arises on their platforms.

[The Minister of State, Home Office (Lord Hanson of Flint) (Lab)]

Through regulation, including the Online Safety Act, companies are now required to stop fraudsters abusing their business models. All parties with a role to play should prioritise tackling fraud, including the tech and telco sectors, which are key partners in the prevention of fraud. However, more can be done, and further action will be set out in the Government’s forthcoming fraud strategy.

[Lord Vaux of Harrowden (CB)]

My Lords, I thank the noble Lord for that Answer. As noble Lords will be aware, banks now have to reimburse fraud victims. However, according to the PSR, over 70% of scams by volume originate online, 54% from Meta alone, and 31% of scams by value originate from telecoms companies. Yet, despite facilitating most of the scams, technology and telecoms companies have no liability for the losses and are subject only to voluntary charters. Indeed, one large telecoms company—let us name it: BT/EE—has started to charge extra to warn people that calls or texts might be a scam. The voluntary charters are clearly not working, so does the Minister agree that tech and telecom companies will take serious action only if they have a real financial liability for the losses, just like the banks do? Does he also agree that it is a disgrace that a company such as BT/EE is profiteering from scams, and will he take action to stop that before the others follow?

[Lord Hanson of Flint (Lab)]

I will certainly look separately into the noble Lord’s question in regard to BT and so on. He will be aware that since March 2025, Ofcom’s illegal content code of practice has come into effect. That means that platforms such as Meta and the others he has mentioned, which contribute through hosting illegal activity and significant levels of fraud, now have a mandate to proactively stop and remove fraudulent content, or else they will face fines and other potential measures. The noble Lord mentioned the disparity between the banks and the platforms. We have the Online Safety Act, which has only just come into effect, and we have potential areas to look at in the fraud strategy. I am aiming to publish the fraud strategy at the end of this year and early next year at the latest. We are working through that currently, and I keep all options open.