Britain is facing a rising tide of online crime such as bank fraud committed by computer hackers, the country's most senior policeman has warned.
By Alastair Jamieson
Sir Paul Stephenson, the Metropolitan Police Commissioner, said organised crime gangs were increasingly turning to the internet in pursuit of illegal profits.
Writing in the Sunday Telegraph he said forces faced with a budget squeeze should not cut specialists tacking such complex crimes in order to maintain bobbies on the beat, adding "Uniform officers alone will not keep the streets safe."
He warned: "My investigators tell me the expertise available to law enforcement is thin, compared to the skills they suspect are at the disposal of cyber criminals."
The warning comes after 11 suspects were charged last week in London, and 37 in New York, at the culmination of the year-long Operation Trident Breach investigation involving the Met and the FBI.Detectives believe a global fraud ring stole $70 million (£44 million) from online bank accounts using the Zeus Trojan, malicious software spread by email which infected thousands of computers and gained access to passwords.
Five more suspects arrested in the Ukraine were said to be kingpins.
In a separate case, another major cyber fraud trial will begin next week.
Sir Paul said organised criminals were "waking up to the profits and uses of e-crime" as an easier way to extort larger sums of money, adding: "The modern Tony Soprano-style crime lord will have a cyber expert on hand."
Yet he disclosed that of the 385 officers in England and Wales dedicated to online work, 85 per cent are fighting people-trafficking and child pornography – leaving fewer than 60 to fight financial crimes such as bank fraud.
Police forces are braced to bear their share of public sector budget cuts, with the Police Federation saying that as many as 40,000 jobs might be axed across England and Wales over the next four years.
Warning against political pressure to maintain the number of uniformed officers, Sir Paul said specialists working on e-crimes were "unseen officers, as far as the public and some politicians are concerned".
"Some commentators argue that we should concentrate on uniformed policing and draw back from specialised work that could be done by others," he said.
"Leave cyber crime to the banks and retailers to sort out, the argument runs. It's a fundamentally misguided argument.
"If the debate about police cutbacks gets bogged down in arguments about 'uniforms before specialists' we will not serve the public well."
He added that online fraud caused "deep distress" to victims and "threatens the integrity of our modern economy".
The Met's e-crime unit cost £2.75 million to run last year, but online fraud generated an estimated £52 billion worldwide in 2007.
It is estimated that the global 'virtual task force' of which the Met is part prevented £21 in potential theft for every £1 spent on it.
Sir Paul said police were only tackling 11 per cent of the 6,000 organised crime groups in England and Wales "in an operationally meaningful way".
source: Telegraph.co.uk
