Police Raise Concerns In The Rise In Credit Card Fraud

Many police forces around the UK have raised concerns that credit card fraud is rising at an alarming rate. Many of the gangs involved in credit card fraud are coming from Eastern Europe and Africa. They use this type of fraud to fund other types of crime such as drugs, arms dealing and terrorism.

To combat this type of crime needs a concerted effort from the Police and the public alike. The Police need to step up actions against these criminals, but to do this they need to be given extra rights. Many of these are being worked into the new criminal justice bills being introduced by the government. These in many cases are being introduced to tackle terrorism, but many of these laws can and should be used against identity fraud crime.

The UK, like most economies around the world rely highly on the automation and electronic means to handle our finances and if we let these criminals not only rip us off via our debit and credit cards we will have a huge problem on our hands in 10 years time.

More than ever we rely on credit cards to fund our daily lives and while this can be critisied by many for causing debt problems bigger than ever before, we will have even bigger problems if the credit card criminals take control of this system. It could cause not only financial problems for the consumer, but also huge problems for the banks as well. If the consumer's trust in the electronic automation of our finances is broken to much people will go back to using cash.

• The ways the consumer can help is by being cautious. Follow these simple steps:
• Cover your hand while typing in your PIN at cash machines and chip and pin machines.
• Shred all paperwork to do with your Credit Card or any other financial information.
• Do not give you credit card details to anyone who you do not know.
• Do not let your credit card out of site. This can happen in restaurants when you pay.

Together we can crack credit crime fraud.