National Trading Standards eCrime Team

The National Trading Standards eCrime Team monitors and investigates a number of online consumer and business frauds including website dating scams, misleading websites, subscription traps and online shopping frauds.

The team provides national support to all local authority areas in England and Wales to help tackle the increasing threats to businesses and consumers from internet scams and rip-offs. The team provides advice and forensic support and undertakes intelligence-led investigations.

Visit the National Trading Standard eCrime Team website for further information.

Our Team in Action

Our eCrime Team have launched advice for consumers around ‘copycat’ websites following a number of investigations that were led by the team. The campaign urged consumers to:

• Use GOV.UK to find government services – it is the easiest and most secure place to find government services and information online.
• Instead of searching for the services you need via a search engine, go to GOV.UK and use the search function there. Then you’ll know you’re on the official site.
• If you do use a search engine, look out for the differences between natural search results and paid-for search results.
• Report a misleading or copycat website to the Citizens Advice Scams Action Service.

For more news about our e-crime team in action see the latest headlines

Learn more

Download our copycat websites infographic

See our press release on how to wise up to the web and avoid being conned by copycat web sites.

Watch our video here: