| Link(s): | Inside FCA Podcast: Fighting fraud and financial crime | FCA Inside FCA Podcast transcript: Interview with Emad Aladhal on fighting fraud and financial crime |
Context
The FCA has published a podcast interview and a transcript with Ozge Ibrahim and Emad Aladhal. Emad talks in detail about the tools the FCA uses to help tackle different types of fraud, including the use of data to identify and prevent harm sooner, partnership work with other organisations and taking assertive enforcement and supervision action. He also outlines his expectations of firms to help tackle financial crime and protect consumers from harm.
Key points to note
The key deliverables under this strategy are reducing money laundering and reducing the growth of fraud. Emad describes the broad toolkit utilised by the Regulator and references ScamSmart – which is a campaign that began in 2017, designed to increase awareness among consumers of how to avoid investment and pension scams.
Emad also alludes to the advancement of AI and how that is fuelling the growth of criminal technology, describing the use of “machine learning” to identify where fraudsters are potentially advertising scams online. Social media platforms and search engines such as Google have been engaged, introducing policies to prevent fraudsters from using these platforms to advertise scams. As many as 100,000 fraudulent websites have been removed and almost 2,000 warnings have been issued over the past year.
Stating that is the responsibility of both the public and private sectors to do their part in preventing financial crime, the rise in Authorised Push Payment or APP fraud has equated to roughly £480 million in losses in 2022. The FCA and Payment Services Regulator are working to achieve policy supervisory changes for regulated firms using APP.
Emad describes the FCA’s expectations of firms regarding fraud prevention and urges firms to share intelligence. Firms must remain vigilant against fraudsters within the financial services industry and prevent their customers from becoming victims of scam activity. Firms must also ensure “their platforms are not used by fraudsters and that by sharing intelligence of fraudulent activity, the financial services industry can respond to the threat as a collective.
Next actions
None – for information and awareness.