UK’s Which? reports survey on mass marketing fraud there
- Nearly nine in 10 adult internet users have encountered content online which they believed to be a scam or fraud.
- Nearly half of adult internet users have personally been drawn into engaging in an online scam or fraud, while four in 10 knew someone who had fallen victim.
- A quarter of those who said they’d encountered online scams lost money as a result, with a fifth being scammed out of £1,000 or more.
- Three in 10 experienced a potential scam or fraud via email, just under a quarter via social media and just under a fifth through websites and apps.
Issue of the week, Recidivism by Fraudsters: A fraud expert and regular reader noted the story above, and suggested that convicted confidence crime criminals (for example, people who do mass marketing fraud and who work in boiler rooms, commit mail fraud, or engage in on-line frauds such as romance scams) have a high rate of re-arrest and continue to be involved in fraud crimes.
One study (by Weisburd & Waring, 2001) found that many criminals in street gangs tend to “age out” of criminal life, but that “white collar” criminals have long careers and possibly learn more tricks and stay in the scam game. This study also found that 62% of those who commit the crimes of mail, credit, or false claims are re-arrested for another crime — a high rate of recidivism.
I’ve surely seen convicted scammers return to their ways after being convicted, and romance scammers often point to the absence of prior arrests in seeking lighter sentences. So:
- Are scammers less likely to be caught and prosecuted?
- Do they tend to get shorter sentences because they don’t have prior arrests?
- And are they more likely to continue to engage in fraud after their jail time?
- What other data bears on the recidivism rates for con criminals?
Let’s open this discussion up, and let me know what your experience is.
