The UK government has banned cold calls selling financial products, including insurance and cryptocurrencies, to tackle fraud. However, fraud is estimated to cost the UK around £7 billion ($8.7 billion) annually. The government’s new fraud strategy involves creating 400 new jobs to modernize its approach to intelligence-led policing.
Collaboration with Ofcom to counter phone number spoofing
The government plans to work with the telecoms regulator, the Office of Communications (Ofcom), to utilize new technology to counter phone number “spoofing.” This would prevent fraudsters from impersonating legitimate UK phone numbers.
With wire fraud now the most prevalent crime in the UK, affecting 1 in 15 people, the government also aims to introduce laws requiring financial institutions to reimburse victims of authorized fraud.
A recent report highlights that organized crime syndicates use the UK as their operational base due to the region’s lenient regulations. Registering a company in the UK is cheap and requires no identification, making it easy for fraudulent companies to set up and gain false credibility.
FCA’s strict approach to crypto company registrations
According to the Financial Services and Markets Act rules for the digital assets market, the UK Financial Conduct Authority (FCA) requires all companies engaged in crypto asset activity to register with it.
However, the FCA’s strict approach to granting approvals has led to several crypto-related businesses operating as unregistered entities.
UK Prime Minister Rishi Sunak has expressed determination to fight scammers, stating they “ruin lives in seconds” and pledging to combat them wherever they attempt to hide.
The government also aims to end the methods like “SIM farms” commonly used by scammers to reach large numbers of people simultaneously and review the use of mass-texting services to prevent criminals from exploiting such technologies.
