In a technology race against crime, it's the scammers who are streaking ahead

The police lack time, resources and the support of a public more fearful of violent crime. One solution is to make the banks take more responsibility

- Martha Gill

Fraud was once something that happened to other people. Up to about a decade ago, it was the preserve of a few doorstep conmen at one extreme and vast corporate swindles at the other - the Lehman Brothers, Enron, Bernie Madoff's pyramid scheme. But now a constant trickle of mid-level fraud has entered every home. We swim in a sea of phishing emails, scam texts and fake adverts on social media. What is surprising is how often it works. Fraud accounts for more than 40% of all crime in Britain.

Identity fraud - where stolen personal details are used to get into bank accounts or to set up new ones - is the most common type, making up 59% of all cases filed to the National Fraud Database, and it is estimated to cost the UK about £1.8bn a year. Purchase scams, often found on social media, are a second, in which buyers send over money but the item never turns up.

Then there are authorised push payments, where people are persuaded to send money to a scammer's account. Romance scams are another growing problem - another way to build a relationship with a potential mark.

A fragmented financial system helps those who want to launder money

The problem is rising sharply: according to the Office for National Statistics (ONS), in the year ending 2024, there were a staggering 4.1m incidents of fraud, an increase of 33% on the previous year. Although the way the ONS gathers statistics over the past 10 years has changed, making it difficult to measure beyond the last few years, some experts talk of "exponential growth" over the past decade.