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London Police Commissioner’s Cyber-Crime Blunder

Wednesday, 14 August 2013

Adrian Leppard, the City of London’s Police Commissioner, has caused turmoil within the cyber-crime industry experts after writing a letter to The Times newspaper denying that the UK Police are struggling to tackle cyber crime and new styles of cyber-criminals.

Cyber Crime

He stated that the Police are “not sitting idly by” while criminals and fraudsters run riot across cyber space taking advantage of victims processing online transactions online and that the City of London is now receiving the tools to “properly engage” these criminals.

This letter shortly follow a report by the Home Affairs Select Committee which concluded that the UK is losing the war on online crime and that the Government has dealt with cyber criminals too complacently. Members of Parliament recommend that a new, state of the art espionage response team be established so that British companies, media enterprises, and institutions can immediately report an attack so fast, effective action can be taken before the criminal can cover their tracks.

The committee also concluded that there appears to be a “black hole” where online crime is left to its own devices, and is often not reported or investigated by law enforcement.

Leppard hit back exclaiming that any victim of online fraud is able to report the crime directly to the Action Fraud call centre knowing that the report will be actioned and analysed by his force’s National Fraud Intelligence Bureau and used in an investigation by local police or, at the very least, “to enrich the national intelligence picture.”

Security expert Ross Anderson, a researcher at Cambridge University, has lashed out at the Government for transferring the Metropolitan Police’s “fairly reasonable” electronic crime unit under SOCA (Serious Organised Crime Agency) which he claims “won’t do anything useful anymore” and has slammed them for being “as much use as a chocolate fireguard.”