VOTE: Online crime is on the increase in North Lincolnshire
ONLINE crimes are rising in North Lincolnshire – but few are being solved.
Figures obtained through a Freedom of Information request (FOI) reveal numbers of internet offences are small, but rising quickly.
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BASIC STEPS Detective Chief Inspector Dave Houchin.
Between 2004 and 2005 just a single incident, relating to grooming, was reported – in 2009 to 2010 the number of reports, made up of fraud, forgery and deception, jumped to 28.
The increase in reports was put down to the ever-increasing number of people using the internet, as well as more criminals operating scams online.
Det Chief Insp Dave Houchin said online crime could be difficult to solve because, unlike other offences, perpetrators were unlikely to be local and could well be based overseas.
He said: "New technologies present countless opportunities for everyone. But this unfortunately includes criminals and the potential anonymity of the internet can make investigations complex.
"The best thing to do, as in all cases, is to take basic steps to reduce the likelihood of becoming a victim in the first place.
"Closing your browser at the end of your session is vitally important so people cannot have access to your data.
"Never input personal or bank details into a website unless you are certain it is secure and always read the certificate on secure sites."
The figures released under the FOI showed from the one offence reported in 2004-05, no offences were recorded in 2005-06, then seven in 2006-07, ten in 2007-08, 25 in 2008-09 and 28 in 2009-10.
Most went unsolved, with the one crime in 2004-05 unsolved, five solved in 2006-07, two in 2007-08, six in 2008-09 and three in 2009-10.
All four divisions of Humberside Police showed similar results; the average percentage of unsolved crimes in A Division, North East Lincolnshire, was 78 per cent, in North Lincolnshire's B-Division the figure was 76 per cent, C-Division, Hull, was 75 per cent and D-Division, the East Riding, 78 per cent.
Pete Turner, spokesman for credit report agency Experian, said: "The internet is accessible to almost everyone and as the number of users grows, so do those using it for criminal purposes.
"Users need to be aware of what information they are giving out online and who might be accessing it."
Comments
by Contax, Brigg
Monday, September 06 2010, 8:07PM
“The sluggish Humberside Police will never beat the online crime they are to backward even for the crawling speed of broadband in this area. Time we had better security systems for on-line banking from the banks, Nationwide give users a code for each transaction to another bank which has to be typed into a handheld gadget which has to have the debit card in then it produces a random code to type in online to complete transaction, it's a pain but if it makes it secure I am all for it. I allways use the virtual keyboard for entering serious user details and passwords as key loggers cannot detect it. Time they made a key that could be plugged into computer that passed a code similar to modern car immobilisers as they seem hard to bypass, of course we would have to pay for it ourselves.”