Fraud Squad

The UK is to ban all cold calls selling financial products as part of a national crackdown on scams.

Unsolicited calls offering any financial product will be covered by the ban, with a view to stopping fraudsters offering sham insurance products or cryptocurrency schemes.

There will also be a new Fraud Squad Set Up with 500 investigators.

However, Labour and the Liberal Democrats called the plans " too little, too late".

Fraud is now The Most common crime in the UK, with one in 15 people falling victim.

Last Summer , 41 million people were targeted by suspicious calls and texts, according to media regulator Ofcom.

The Cold Call ban follows a ban on cold-calling about pension products, which was introduced in 2019.

The government said the blanket ban - which will cover legitimate calls as Well - will mean that " anyone who receives a call trying to sell them products such as cryptocurrency schemes or insurance will know it's a scam".

Prime Minister Rishi Sunak said that the new rules will tackle " cold-hearted" scammers who " ruin lives in seconds. "

But the Labour Party said the measures were " too little, too late".

Emily Thornberry , Labour's shadow Attorney General , said: " This has been billed as a fully-integrated blueprint to tackle the entirety of Britain's fraud crisis, yet it ignores the tens of billions being lost to fraud against businesses and the government, and relies on estimates of the cost of fraud to members of The Public that are seven years out of date. "

And Alistair Carmichael , Home Affairs spokesperson for the Liberal Democrats , said: " With only one new investigator for every 9,000 cases Last Year , the [new] Fraud Squad is just a drop in The Ocean compared to what's needed to protect fraud victims.

" These plans will also put even more of a burden on local police forces who are already overstretched. "

Consumer group Which? welcomed the strategy but also criticised the government for not acting sooner.

" The Fight against fraud has progressed far too slowly in recent years and in particular more action is needed to guarantee that big tech platforms take serious action against fraud, " it said.

The Plan to tackle fraud also includes measures to stop phone number " spoofing".

This is where scammers change The Telephone number and name relayed as Caller ID information to trick people into believing a call is genuine.

So-called " Sim Farms" where people use a large number of Sim cards to send text messages in bulk, will also be banned.

The new National Fraud Squad will work with local and international forces and UK intelligence services, the government said.

There will also be a £30m fraud reporting service to replace the current Action Fraud service.

More Than Two Thirds of fraud in Britain it either committed from overseas or has an international link, the government said.

The government says fraud costs the UK nearly £7bn per year, and nearly 90% of internet users have encountered online scams.

Source of news: bbc.com