Question to the Home Office:

To ask Her Majesty's Government, further to the Written answer by Baroness Williams of Trafford on 5 March (HL5646), whether the improvements to Action Fraud's IT systems will include allowing the registration as a crime of online fraud where an attempt is made to defraud but the intended victim aborts the transaction before any damage is done.

Reports received by Action Fraud are subject to the Home Office Counting Rules for Fraud and Computer Misuse. In most cases a crime will be recorded where the victim responds to a fraudulent approach (such as a phishing email) but does not incur financial loss.

Receipt of a fraudulent approach which did not lead to any further action may be reported to Action Fraud but is not counted as a crime. It is instead treated as an information report and is used by the National Fraud Intelligence Bureau to identify links between seemingly unexpected fraud attempts. This situation will remain the same when the improved reporting portal is launched.