UK rises to number two in cyber-crime chart

A REPORT PUBLISHED by the Internet Complaint Crime Centre (IC3) not only puts reported losses due to web-based crime in 2007 at an all-time high of $240 million, but also notes that criminal activity from within the UK is the second worst in the world.

The IC3 said it received more than 206,000 complaints on its website in 2007 slightly down on the year before.

Some 90,000 complaints were referred to US law enforcement agencies. Of these, 15.3 per cent were attributed to the UK, with traditional hotbeds of illegal activity like Nigeria and Romania clocking up just 5.7 and 1.5 per cent respectively.

The USA still heads the cyber-crime figures at 63.2 per cent of reported cases, one of which happen every six seconds.

Internet auction fraud was by far the biggest problem at 35.7 per cent with non-delivery or non-payment reaching 24.9 per cent. Con artists clocked up 6.7 per cent of complaints while credit card scams and other financial crimes represented 17.6 per cent.

And, according to the figures, men lost more money to fraudsters than women. Apparently men lost $1.67 for every $1 lost by women. Quite waht this is supposed to show is unclear.

The underlying figures are also reckoned to be far in excess of these as most people are too embarrassed to admit they've been duped. µ

L'Inq
IC3 report (pdf)