Outsourcing supremo Capita has been awarded a £50m contract, alongside PwC, to replace the Action Fraud cyber crime reporting service.
The irony of this news will not be lost as Capita is facing possible regulatory investigations over its cyber security stuff-ups after 90 of its customers, including pension funds and well-known brands had their customer and staff data stolen from its systems in a ransomware attack.
The replacement of Action Fraud comes after the service was slammed for its multiple failings. In 2021, a Work and Pensions Committee report on pensions scams and fraud outlined multiple concerns with the body, many of them stemming from a 2019 investigation by The Times which alleged staff malpractice and inadequate resourcing at the service, which the City of London Police oversees.
Capita will provide contact centre resources and the underlying technology to enable the public to make reports. PwC, meanwhile will provide technology services for the crime and intelligence management underpinning the National Fraud Intelligence Bureau (NFIB), which assesses and analyses the reports currently received by Action Fraud. The new service is scheduled to become operational by the end of June 2024. Action Fraud’s existing services and systems will remain in place until that time.
