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Joint Fraud Taskforce board minutes: 21 October 2021

Published 11 April 2022

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  • Date: Thursday, 21 October 2021
  • Location: Virtual

Item 1: Welcome, updated Terms of Reference and governance structure

1. The Security Minister welcomed attendees to the relaunch of the JFT and said to achieve its aims, this group would need to have oversight of communications work on fraud, the public-private elements of the Fraud Action Plan (including the Fraud Sector Charters) and the Online Fraud Steering Group. To reflect these programmes of work, the Home Office have updated the membership of the board and the Terms of Reference.

Item 2: Overview of the Fraud Action Plan

2. The Home Office presented an overview of the draft Plan. The Home Office has identified key pillars to strengthen leadership and cooperation across the public and private sectors:

  • a. Protect - protection for the public and victims of fraud and how we support that, including through coordination of messaging and restricting fraudsters’ opportunity through industry action.

  • b. Disrupt - using a variety of capabilities to support the fight against fraud, including taking down websites, undermining fraudulent infrastructure and targeting high harm offenders. The UK Intelligence Community are also doing work to prevent frauds from reaching the public and working with online service providers and device manufacturers to enhance the security of UK citizens by default.

  • c. Pursue focuses on how we increase criminal justice outcomes and increase intelligence on fraud, including the replacement of Action Fraud.

3. The Home Office said that there is ongoing work on improving metrics with law enforcement. In addition, the Online Fraud Steering Group has prioritised improving the metrics available from the data held by the banking and tech sector.

Item 3: Launch of the Sector Charters

4. The Security Minister said he was pleased to see the positive reception the charters had received. He commented there is more that can be done to improve our collective response and we need charters for other industries, with the insurance and tech sectors as possible candidates.

5. ICAEW, UK Finance and CCSG provided overviews of their respective charters.

6. In discussion the following points were raised:

  • the charter programme will achieve much but changes to legislation are also likely to be necessary
  • there remain considerable challenges to blocking SMS bulk buying
  • telecoms companies are blocking many scam calls each month but the stats show that scammers are still trying relentlessly to get through. If we know more about fake texts, we can block before they are perpetuated
  • there are multiple players in sectors and to make a real impact we need to reach out to more companies
  • the insurance sector is working with the Home Office on development of their own charter
  • need for greater fraud-focused law enforcement resource
  • it was important that victim support is included in formal process and has the right language for those who are experiencing this as can be overly technical. Victims can be unsure where to go, what to do and what victimisation looks like

Item 4: Launch of the NECC/NCA Public Engagement Team

7. NECC presented on their new public engagement team and its approach. They said that the ambition is to:

  • a. strengthen the coalition of partners across the public, private and third sectors;

  • b. develop an overarching ‘umbrella’ communications campaign; and

  • c. ensure clear and coherent messaging across fraud and cyber communications.

8. The following points were raised in discussion:

  • there is need for coordination to understand the most effective communication measures
  • we need to better understand the psychological devices employed by fraudsters in order to deliver better protect advice
  • CIFAS have just completed research work on consumers
  • Citizens Advice said they were happy to bring their organisations expertise to the table and to help support
  • it was noted that the first meeting of the Economic Crime Strategic Communications Steering Group would be in November 2021

Item 5: Progress of the Online Fraud Steering Group

9. Tech UK delivered a presentation on the work of the OFSG. The group has four priorities:

  • a. identify what threats are (how do threats occur);

  • b. what can we do;

  • c. communicate (educate and awareness);

  • d. disrupt (through sharing information).

10. The following points were raised in discussion:

  • there is a need to better understand why the UK is a popular target for fraudsters
  • data sharing is key and the biggest barrier in this area is legal caution
  • the NECC would be keen to use the national data exploitation capability

11. The Security Minister concluded the meeting.

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