Estate agents should do more to tackle conveyancing fraud
A leading compliance specialist in the estate agency market has suggested that estate agents should be doing more to support efforts to complete customer due diligence and tackle money laundering. Compliance Officer for The Guild of Property Professionals, Paul Offley, has said that agents should be following “best practice” to establish the legal/beneficial owner of […]
Failure to introduce “proper risk assessments” number one AML failure
A review completed by the Solicitors Regulations Authority into law firm anti-money laundering failures has identified a 40% increase in the number of potential AML breaches reported to the SRA, with the number one area of non-compliance is not having a proper risk assessment in place for AML matters. The SRA has published its first […]
NatWest admits to anti-money laundering offences
NatWest Bank has admitted to three charges relating to anti-money laundering failures. NatWest, the state-backed bank formerly known as Royal Bank of Scotland, will face “very large fines” according to experts, following its failure to prevent alleged money laundering of £365 million by a single customer. The criminal action, first announced by the Financial Conduct […]
London a hotbed of tax avoidance for offshore firms
Newly released Land Registry data has revealed the overseas companies that own property in England and Wales, with a considerable ‘hotspot’ in London and interest from ‘tax haven’ organisations rife. The analysis comes in the week an International Consortium of Investigative Journalists (ICIJ) report exposed the extent of major world figures and leaders using offshore […]
AML update – are you keeping up to date!
Access Legal’s latest quarterly AML update webinar is being held on 14 October 2021 at 12.30pm, and as usual we will be joined by Bill Jones, a financial crime specialist. With Natwest Bank facing a substantial fine for AML non-compliance, the release of the Pandora papers, and the Solicitors Regulation Authority launching investigations into 10% […]
Cyber Essentials Plus – A Case Study
The National Centre for Cyber Security (NCSC) has identified the legal sector as a top target for cyber criminals. According to the Solicitors Regulation Authority (SRA), £11 million was stolen by cyber criminals last year. Fraudsters are now taking advantage of new vulnerabilities in systems introduced with the remote working revolution due to COVID. As […]
Conveyancing and Cyber-crime
Action Fraud’s latest fraud reports show that there were £2.35bn of reported losses in the last 12 months (to March 2021), with 80% of all reported fraud being cyber enabled. The pandemic has exacerbated levels of fraud as the volume of digital transactions across all sectors has increased by an estimated 40%, leaving consumers more […]
Economic Crime Levy draft legislation published
Following a consultation between July and October last year on how funds could be raised to help the UK’s fight against economic crime, the Government has now published its proposals and draft legislation which will bring the levy in to effect. The economic crime levy announced by the Government at the 2020 Budget in March […]
Solicitor duped by fraudster client fined by SRA
The SRA has reprimanded and fined a solicitor who inadvertently helped a client to commit theft. The incident, which took place at the North East firm SJ Palin & Co Solicitors, caused the SRA to publish a decision notice explaining the event, rebuking the firm’s sole practitioner Mr Palin in the process. An unnamed client […]
Impersonation fraud losses rocket
The scale of criminal activity which leads to financial loss has been laid bare by UK Finance’s half year fraud update. In total £753.9 million was stolen through fraud, an increase of 30 per cent compared to the same period last year. As banks improve their security measures, for the first time Authorised Push Payment (APP) […]
Index Property Information Invites Law Firms to Discover More About Automation of Risk & Third-Party Data at Law Society AML & Financial Crime Conference
Index Property Information, a sponsor of the Law Society AML & Financial Crime online conference on 21 & 22 September 2021, is inviting small and medium sized law firms to discover more about Automation of Risk and Third-Party Data at a virtual workshop on day two of the event. Kate Bould, Director of Index West […]
The rise of cyber-criminal threat for law firms since Covid-19
The global coronavirus pandemic, and the rise in people working from home, has unfortunately provoked a growth in cyber-crime. The UK Government estimates that the cost of cyber-crime is £27bn per annum. The legal sector handles sensitive data and large financial transactions, which makes it an attractive target for cyber criminals, who are constantly looking […]
Ransomware attacks up by 518% in the last year
Cybercriminals are becoming more aggressive, a recent report reveals. The report shows that cybercrime gangs are using even more sophisticated ransomware to extort millions from firms across the UK. The average ransomware demand has also increased by 518% from $847,000 in 2020, to around $5.3 million in 2021, with the highest single demand sitting at […]
UK bank account fraud 25% up year on year
New research from Experian has revealed that bank account fraud is now tracking at its highest level for more than three years. Drawing on the latest data from the National Hunter Fraud Prevention Service, the analysis uncovered an alarming surge in fraudulent activity targeting British businesses and consumers. The fraud rate for current accounts rose […]
HMRC expected to resume pre-pandemic levels of SDLT investigations
The number of Stamp Duty Land Tax (SDLT) tax investigations by HMRC has fallen by 75% in the last year, from 2,096 in 2019/20 to 529 in 2020/21, the lowest figure in five years, a Freedom of Information request from law firm Boodle Hatfield reveals. The drop in investigations is thought to be due to […]
Charges removed from properties of illegal money lender victims
The Financial Conduct Authority (FCA) has obtained a High Court Order to remove hundreds of HM Land Registry charges, notices and restrictions registered against consumers’ properties by illegal money lender Dharam Prakash Gopee. The Financial Conduct Authority (FCA) has successfully obtained a High Court Order to remove approximately 625 charges, notices or restrictions registered in […]
Digital ID Trust Scheme on trial in 11 locations
Estate agents, licensed conveyancers, solicitors and mortgage intermediaries operating in Battersea, Chiswick, Clapham, Putney, Wimbledon, Richmond, Kew, Cheltenham, Gloucester, Harrogate and York are to be the first to benefit this year from trials of a new digital identity trust scheme to make home buying and selling a quicker and more secure digital process. These geographical […]
How digital onboarding can give your firm competitive advantage
In today’s world of e-commerce and online banking, consumers expect instant access to services in a safe and secure environment. In the legal industry, meeting the needs and expectations of clients is key in an evolving, challenging and competitive legal environment. Unrivalled client experience differentiates law firms from competitors and added value will give fee […]
Fraud and computer misuse crimes rise by more than a third
The Office for National Statistics (ONS) Crime Survey for England and Wales showed that there were an estimated 4.6 million fraud offences in the year ending March 2021, a 24% increase compared with 2020 figures. The survey also revealed that fraud and computer misuse offences have risen by more than a third in England and […]
Law firms in SRA firing line over AML failures
The fines levied by the SRA on 13 firms in recent weeks continue to demonstrate a fundamental lack of understanding around responsibilities when it comes to the money laundering regulations. The firms in question had failed to comply with their procedural responsibilities to provide their firm-wide AML risk assessment and delayed their AML declarations. In […]
