‘Online crime must be included in the Home Secretary’s policing reforms’

In a speech at the annual conference hosted by the National Police Chiefs’ Council and Association for Police and Crime Commissioners today, Home Secretary Yvette Cooper will outline a new Home Office unit to monitor performance of police forces. Tijs Broeke, who will be at the conference, sets out why this important step to strengthen scrutiny of performance should include online crime – working together to make Britain safer, both on our streets and online.

For the first time in over a decade, a dedicated Home Office unit will be introduced to directly monitor police performance, including in high-priority areas such as tackling violence against women and girls, knife crime and improving neighbourhood policing.

With over 90% of reported crimes now have a digital component, creating both challenges and opportunities for police investigations – we need to make sure online crime is included in the Home Secretary’s approach.

At the last London Policing Board, London Victims’ Champion Claire Waxman and I asked the Metropolitan Police Commissioner Sir Mark Rowley about the epidemic of online abuse especially in the context of violence against women and girls. All stalking cases now have an online element, online ‘influencers’ are radicalising boys into extreme misogyny, the most common age of victims of online and tech-enabled violence against women and girls last year was 10-15 year olds.

The importance of digital safety

Indeed, alarming new data from Internet Matters reveals half a million UK teenagers have encountered AI-generated deepfake abuse. As someone passionate about digital safety, and a father of a young son this hits hard. We need policing, education and legislation to catch up.

I asked the Commissioner what his assessment of the current policing capabilities to tackle online abuse and hatred are, and if he agreed that social media and tech sector needs to do more to stop online harm. Sir Mark said modern policing doesn’t just require more officers, but also investment in tech and human capabilities to deal with the online components of crime.

Something which is important when looking to half violence against women and girls. The Commissioner also indicated that he would welcome if government will strengthen online harm legislation to include “lawful but harmful” cases – something the last government dropped from their plans.

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Another major area of online related crime is fraud. Today, fraud accounts for 39 per cent of crime in England and Wales. But less than two per cent of police resources are dedicated to combating it. While there have been some improvements, there is still a fundamental problem with how fraud is addressed by policing.

A report from His Majesty’s Inspectorate of Constabulary and Fire and Rescue Services, which inspects our police forces, underlines the prevailing attitude of some towards fraud. Unlike violent crime, the Inspectorate noted, fraud doesn’t “bang, bleed or shout”. This is the problem: It doesn’t make the front pages of tabloids, drive urgent parliamentary debates, or trigger calls for more neighbourhood officers.

Annually £6.8bn billion is lost to fraud. But fraud isn’t just a financial issue. It is a matter of people’s lives—families ruined, mental health shattered, trust eroded.

It was good therefore to see Chancellor Rachel Reeves use her first Mansion House speech last week to write, together with the Home Secretary and Secretary of State for Science, Innovation and Technology, to tech and telecommunication sectors calling for them to go further and faster in reducing the scale of fraud taking place on their platforms and networks – with an update on progress requested by March 2025 ahead of an expanded fraud strategy as promised in Labour’s election manifesto.

Making the web more safe

The recent appointment of Lord Hanson as the Home Office Minister responsible for fraud is also promising. But to truly make a difference, fraud needs to be made a national policing requirement in its own right and the fight against economic and online crime must be embedded into wider government actions.

Safety shouldn’t just apply to our physical streets – it is essential to look at the online footprint of crime as well.

There are four priorities government could look at:

• Ensure the Inspectorate includes ‘digital policing response’ and specifically fraud in its inspection of local policing forces
• Embed fight against online crime across government actions to drive the both the Safter Streets and the Economic Growth missions
• Hold global tech platforms and telco firms accountable to go further and faster
• Improve digital, analytical and asset-recovery capabilities of the police to reimburse more victims and fund more officers

In the plans announced by the Home Secretary today officer time spent on the frontline will be monitored.

This is important, but to improve police effectiveness and strengthen public trust, time spent on the digital front line should also have a place in her performance drive.

The Home Secretary is right we are a critical juncture for the future of policing, and if as a country we are to remain equipped to fight the fast-changing challenges of today and tomorrow, then policing must evolve to bring the founding principles of policing by consent and preventing crime to the 21st Century both on our streets and online.

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