The cost of living crisis has created a financial crime wave. So what is being done about it?
Struggling to make ends meet during a period of high inflation, people are being preyed on by fraudsters seeking to take advantage of their predicament. Andrew Pimlott outlines the threats and how payment service providers, regulators, and the government are responding.
Fraud, money laundering, and other financial crimes are on the rise. There are several reasons for this upward trend, but one of them is clearly the cost of living crisis. The soaring price of energy, other commodities, manufactured goods, and services is placing an intolerable burden on household budgets. Inflation is running at 9.9% and is expected to remain above 10% for a few months before starting to come down, according to the Bank of England. Salaries are failing to keep up in most cases.
Under financial pressure, people are more likely to succumb to scams that falsely promise to earn them, or save them, money. Some might even be tempted to engage in criminality, by becoming “money mules” to launder criminals’ ill-gotten gains, or by committing acts of fraud themselves.
What is being done to stem this rising tide? The answer is that private and public sector organizations, which have always worked in concert to tackle financial crime, are working harder to come up with new solutions. Banks, online retailers, shops, and other companies are approaching the problem…
