The Fraud Pandemic: The Future of Criminalisation of Fraud in England and Wales
By (Author) Jennifer Collins
Bloomsbury Publishing PLC
Hart Publishing
8th January 2026
United Kingdom
Professional and Scholarly
Non Fiction
Financial law: general
Computer crime, cybercrime
Hardback
272
Width 156mm, Height 234mm
This book provides the first in-depth scholarly analysis of fraud, the highest volume crime in England and Wales, addressing the challenges faced in building a principled criminal law response by presenting an innovative normative analysis.
The UK is now in a pandemic of fraud. There were 4.6 million fraud offences recorded in the year ending March 2021, accounting for 42% of all crime committed against individuals. Fraud is now the highest volume crime in England and Wales; its incidence in the first half of 2021 was described by UK Finance as a national security threat.
The book provides the answers to key questions, such as:
- How can the rapidly changing nature of fraud be understood and mapped by criminal lawyers
- How does fraud connect to economic crime more broadly
- Is the current landscape for criminalising fraud fit for purpose, in the light of changes to the nature and complexity of wrongdoing
- What are the principled limits to using Artificial Intelligence technologies to detect and to penalise fraud
- Which principles should inform fraud criminalisation and governance following the COVID-19 pandemic, to meet the challenges of a digital age and a stretched criminal justice system
Jennifer Collins is Associate Professor in Law at the University of Bristol, UK.