Huw Jones
LONDON (Reuters) – HSBC, its online divisions First Direct and Metro Bank have joined a fraud reporting hotline as the cost of living crisis increases the number of financial institutions. An industry body said Tuesday the scam.
With more and more people banking online, the UK has become the fraud capital of the world, especially since the COVID- pandemic started in 2020 spread.
Stop Scams UK, the banking and online industry network launched a year ago, allows customers to call 19 to report fraud to their own bank , without having to look up its number.
Members already include Barclays (London: BARC ), Meta, Microsoft (NASDAQ: MSFT ), Google (NASDAQ: MSFT ) Duck: GOOGL), NatWest, National Building Society, Santander (BME: SAN) and Talk Talk.
” by calling 19 it will help people break the spell of the liar, which is an important filling Cake customers can use to help protect their armor,” said Baz Thompson, head of fraud at Metro Bank.
Banking body British Finance says there has been a % increase in fraudsters tricking customers into making real-time payments last year.
In cash, criminal gangs steal 583 millions of pounds from individuals and small businesses pretending to be banks or other service providers.
“The cost of living crisis will only make the problem worse,” Stop Scams UK said.
Faced with skyrocketing energy, mortgage and food bills, more households will be vulnerable to scams.
HSBC, First Direct and Metro add .50 million customers to 159 service, which now covers the vast majority of UK bank customers, Stops Scams UK said.
Since its launch last September, there have been more than 150, 000 C All calls to the hotline, the UK proposes an ‘Online Safety Act’ to help regulators crack down on financial fraud.
Banks hope the bill will include clearer guidance allowing them to share anonymous customer data to detect new types of scams faster, but it faces opposition from privacy activists.
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