The crime figures are based on 31,166 face-to-face interviews of people aged 16 years and over.
There were an estimated 3.2 million fraud offences in the year to September 2023, accounting for 48% of all crimes. However, fewer than one in seven fraud offences are reported to the police or Action Fraud.
Here we take a closer look at the latest figures and explore why so many victims fail to report fraud to the relevant authorities.
Fraud is still the most dominant crime
Fraud is the most common type of crime affecting people in England and Wales (6% of households experienced this), followed by vehicle-related theft (3%) and criminal damage (2%).
It accounted for nearly half of the estimated 6.7 million crimes recorded in the year ending September 2023, though fraud has fallen by 13% compared with the previous year when there were an estimated 3.7 million offences.
The ONS said there was a notable reduction in advance fee fraud (33%). This is when fraudsters target victims to make advance or upfront payments for goods, services and/or financial gains that never materialise.
Meanwhile, computer misuse – when fraudsters hack or use computer viruses or malware to disrupt services, obtain information illegally or extort individuals or organisations – increased by 30%, largely due to an increase in unauthorised access to personal information.
What about fraud reported to banks and Action Fraud?
UK Finance, an industry body for banks and other financial services, reported a 22% increase in banking and credit industry fraud (to 489,596 offences) compared with the year ending September 2022 (399,966 offences). It said this was a result of an increase in reporting from existing members.
If you're in England, Wales and Northern Ireland, Action Fraud is the national fraud and cybercrime reporting centre. Those living in Scotland should report fraud to Police Scotland by calling 101.
Action Fraud said reported fraud fell by 4% (to 297,980 offences) compared with the year ending September 2022 (309,469 offences).
The biggest fall was in '419' advance fee fraud (down 44% to 843 reports), where fraudsters ask you for money to release millions from a fictional inheritance or government fund. The '419' refers to the section of the Nigerian Criminal Code dealing with the charges and penalties for fraud offences.
While online shopping and auction scams are most commonly reported to Action Fraud, reaching 66,634 in this period, other fraud types are growing areas of concern - timeshares and holiday club fraud is up 178% to 189, ticket fraud up 25% to 7,831 and fraud recovery up 19% to 2,756.
Find out more:Why is fraud underreported?
If you’re the one to notice fraud, you should contact your bank in the first instance to try to recover your money - yet we've found that many victims don't tell their banks.
Younger victims, those aged between 18 and 24, were less likely to report the incident to their bank than victims aged 65 or over (37% versus 60%), while only 14% of female victims of fraud reported it to the police, compared with 23% of men.
Our survey also found that only 24% of fraud victims had contacted Action Fraud – 23% of these said they didn’t know they could report it to Action Fraud at all, while 17% said they didn’t think Action Fraud would do anything about it.
Find out more: undefinedsource https://www.which.co.uk/news/article/fraud-falls-13-but-remains-most-dominant-crime-adxVQ5e8Ak0O