Fighting Fraud in Real Time

Fraud has become a global, industrialised system — powered by AI, behavioural manipulation, and cross-border criminal networks. Drawing on insights from the IDnow TrustSphere event in Munich, this article explores how modern fraud operates like a gig economy, why behavioural design and education are essential to prevention, and why real-time data collaboration is now critical to building fraud-resilient systems.

Fraud Is Evolving Faster Than We’re Measuring It – But New Intelligence Helps Us Catch Up

The Global Fraud Index 2025 reveals how fraud is evolving into a systemic global risk, driven by misaligned policy, technology, and economic pressures. Drawing on the latest data, this article explores why rising fraud activity, AI-enabled identity crime, and uneven government intervention show that prevention is no longer just a technical challenge, but a question of how resilient our digital societies really are.

Scam Design: How Online Products & Services Are Engineered for Exploitation

This article reframes online scams not as isolated acts of deception, but as deliberately designed products built with the same tools, patterns, and user-experience tactics used in legitimate e-commerce. By examining how scammers capture attention, build trust, exploit dark patterns, and engineer seamless payment flows, it reveals scams as structured service journeys rather than random events. Understanding fraud as a design system—not a personal failing—helps us identify choke points, strengthen platforms, and rethink how digital environments enable exploitation.

Economic Abuse Must Be Seen.. and Stopped

This article explores the hidden reality of economic abuse—how financial control, coercion, and digital exclusion trap women in unsafe relationships and leave long-lasting financial harm. Drawing on lived experience and emerging research, it highlights the scale of economic abuse in the UK, its impact on safety, mental health, work, and independence, and why financial services, employers, and policymakers must respond. It invites women to share their experiences through an anonymous survey to shape better protections, support, and economic freedom.

Fraud Prevention and the Greatest Good: Who Gets Left Behind?

This article explores how traditional fraud-prevention strategies, built on utilitarian “greatest good for the greatest number” thinking, can unintentionally expose vulnerable customers to greater financial-crime risk. By examining digital exclusion, socio-economic barriers, and accessibility challenges, it argues for inclusive, evidence-based system design that protects those most targeted by offenders. Criminals exploit the gaps majority-first controls leave behind—so effective financial-crime prevention must prioritise equity, alternative pathways, and criminology-informed design to keep everyone safe.

Always Learning

One of the things I love about working in the world of financial crime is that you never stop learning. Criminals are endlessly inventive. Regulators keep reshaping the rules. Technology evolves faster than we can sometimes keep pace. If you’re not open to refreshing your knowledge, you risk falling behind.

That’s why I try and make sure I put aside time purely for learning. This time I used it to complete the AML Fundamentals course by Sumsub. Yes, this is the course I posted about on the train! I didn’t get it all done on that journey, but I did do a few modules and it was engaging enough that I returned to it doing little and often over the next week or so.  It’s online course, that you can do at your own pace – something I found super useful when juggling work/life/learning balance!

An Unexpected Secret Weapon for Fraud Leaders: A Criminologist on Call

Fraudsters rehearse their scripts for months. But your call centre agent might get 20 seconds. Customers replace stolen phones without telling their bank, while criminals quietly log in on the new device. And when new regulations arrive, everyone scrambles to comply – only to find fraud losses rising in unexpected ways. Unfortunately, these aren’t abstract problems. They’re real-world cracks in the system that I’ve seen again and again in my work with banks and fintechs, and vulnerability research. They’re also perfect examples of why having a criminologist inside your team can change the game. Let’s solve some of these problems together using criminological understanding and fraud prevention by design principles.

When Fraud Meets Friction: How to Design Financial Systems Where Crime Doesn’t Fit

Designing out financial crime means building systems where fraud can’t easily happen in the first place. Instead of reacting to new threats with more alerts and monitoring, this approach applies criminology, human-centred design, and smart friction to block criminal opportunities at the root. From safer digital journeys and layered defences to risk-based delays, interoperability, and protections for vulnerable users, designing out crime creates resilient products that stay ahead of deepfakes, AI-driven scams, instant payments and cross-platform fraud. Explore how financial services can shift from patching weaknesses to architecting crime-resistant systems from day one.

Let’s Talk About Fraud [Awareness Campaigns]

International Fraud Awareness Week (16–22 November) is a chance to rethink fraud prevention beyond firewalls and phishing tests – focusing on staff wellbeing, mobile security, and responsible AI use to close everyday vulnerability gaps and change real-world behaviour.

Breaking Down Fraud: From Ticket Resale to Phone Theft

Fraud isn’t a one-off crime — it’s a global, networked industry thriving in the gaps between social media, financial services, and public policy. Drawing on UK case studies presented at Sardine Con, this article examines how ticket resale fraud and smartphone-theft-enabled banking scams reveal deeper systemic weaknesses. When well-intentioned policies push consumers onto unregulated platforms, or when app design enables seamless account takeover, criminals gain the upper hand. Understanding these patterns is vital for anyone working in fraud prevention, consumer protection, fintech, or policy development.