Question to the Home Office:

To ask the Secretary of State for the Home Department, what criteria must reports submitted to Action Fraud meet in order to be investigated.

291218: All reports submitted to Action Fraud are subject to risk assessments, which take into account the following:

• Vulnerability of the victim(s)
• Priority crime types i.e. those assessed as the highest harm across multiple categories
• Financial harm of individual or linked cases
• Lines of inquiry for investigations on suspect information or identifiers, i.e. account information, email addresses, telephone numbers, websites
• Crime or not under Home Office Counting Rules
• Other risk indicators through an assessment of key words which vary over time
• Links with other reports of similar offences

291223: Action Fraud is working in conjunction with Victim Support in London to identify vulnerable victims and provide them with additional advice and support to stop them becoming repeat victims.

• All forces receive details of victims in their area each week, which enables them to deliver victim support and provide advice and guidance on crime prevention
• Particularly high risk reports with victim care needs are prioritised and sent to forces for further action
• The National Economic Crime Victim Care Unit (NECVCU) pilot delivers victim care for victims whose cases have not been referred to a local police force for investigation, covering specific force areas: City of London Police, Metropolitan Police, Nottinghamshire, West Midlands, Kent and Greater Manchester.
• NFIB Protect Alerts are issued to the public and local neighbourhood policing teams based on reporting trends and intelligence
• NFIB disrupts websites, emails and telephone numbers reportedly engaged in fraud to prevent further offending

NFIB’s Project Recall alerts banks when reports of recent fraudulent transactions are made, which often results in payments being stopped or returned to the victim.

Action Fraud is the national reporting point for fraud and cyber crime. Since April 2013, it has taken reports of these crimes on behalf of all police forces in England and Wales. Once Action Fraud has received a crime report, that information is considered by the National Fraud Intelligence Bureau (NFIB). Where there is enough evidence available and a viable lead, actionable intelligence packages are created and sent to the appropriate police force to consider whether enforcement activity should take place. Neither Action Fraud nor the NFIB are investigatory agencies. It is still for local forces to consider enforcement activity. Both Action Fraud and the NFIB are run by the City of London Police, which is the national lead force for fraud.