The list below is a collection of articles that refer to, mention or discuss Crime.
Unscrupulous builders are scamming online find-a-trader platforms by bribing customers to post fake reviews, a web site owner claims. Even though thousands of home owners rely on honest review sites when making a choice about which tradesmen to hire, customers are offered cash discounts to post favourable reviews of their work. The revelation comes from … Read more
Pension trustee Roger Bessent boosted his own finances by treating other people’s retirement savings as his personal piggy bank, a court heard. Bessent siphoned nearly £300,000 from pensions he was running to fund his business and buy to let investments. He covered his tracks with false records alleging other trustees had agreed the spending – … Read more
Europe’s top policeman has joined the clamour for more regulation of cryptocurrency to stop organised crime gangs from laundering their illicit cash. Europol director Rob Wainwright reckons criminals generate £100 billion each year from people trafficking, drugs, illegal weapons and other activities – and that between £3 billion and £4 billion is washed clean through … Read more
Unwanted telephone calls from pension scammers are one of the most despicable marketing tactics that rob innocent savers of their retirement income. Lawmakers are determined to see a cold-call ban on pension scammers in place across Britain by June 2018 at the latest, but will the ban really make a difference? Strict laws will apply … Read more
It’s time ditch any £50 or 500 Euro bank notes stashed under the mattress as governments move to scrap larger denomination bank notes. Both the Bank of England and European Central Bank (ECB) are considering withdrawing the notes from circulation. Police call the notes the ‘currency of choice’ for money laundering, tax evasion, organised crime … Read more
Unlucky investors who took up an opportunity to ‘recover’ investments lost in carbon credit and rare earth metal scams fell victim to fraudsters twice. Not only was the original investment a con, but the white knights who claimed they could rescue the victims were also fraudsters. Now, the six companies targetting scammed investors have been … Read more
Victims of fraud can no longer rely on the police to recover their stolen assets and need to take their own steps to fight scammers, says a leading law firm. The warning comes after the Royal Bank of Scotland revealed 5,000 customers lost almost £26 million to fraudsters in the first none months of this … Read more
Bitcoin hackers stole £3.2 million of the virtual currency by accessing secure servers through an unprotected personal computer in an online attack on leading exchange Bitstamp, according to a leaked report. The report allegedly drafted by Bitstamp investigators pinpointed a personal laptop linked to the exchange computer network as a weak point in security. The … Read more
£160 billion cash held in onshore savings accounts was earning interest at 0.5% or less in 2013 – and confused investors often do not know how much banks and building societies are paying in interest rates. As a result, one in eight savers has not switched accounts in the past three years, says the Financial … Read more
The financial consequences of investing in virtual currencies have become clearer following a £3.3 million hack of one of the UK’s leading Bitcoin platforms. Bitstamp lost 19,000 Bitcoins when computer systems were compromised by hackers earlier this month. The exchange investigated the incident and determined someone had hacked their systems and stolen the virtual currency. … Read more