FINTECH STRATEGIES
T he UK is at an inflection point on fraud. Regulation is tightening, reimbursement obligations now carry real economic weight, and the UK National Fraud Strategy 2026-29 is pushing for a more coordinated response across sectors. Yet the reality remains uneven. Fraud continues to scale. Customer trust is under pressure and banks still carry disproportionate responsibility for a problem that originates well beyond their perimeter.
At the centre is a structural tension. Growth depends on removing friction – faster onboarding, real-time payments, embedded journeys that disappear into the background. Fraud exploits those same features.
Measures range from the creation of a new Online Crime Centre for cross – sector data sharing through to a more coordinated national response spanning financial services, technology, telecoms, retail and law enforcement.
But the response runs the risk of leaning too heavily on controls applied too late in the journey to materially change outcomes.
The limits of reactive controls The reimbursement requirement for authorised push payment fraud has sharpened incentives. Losses now sit more firmly with banks, forcing tighter intervention at the point of payment.
THE THREE PILLARS
Backed by more than £ 250m( US $ 335m) of investment, it focuses on three pillars
Disrupting fraud earlier in the lifecycle
Strengthening resilience across organisations and improving support
Reimbursement for victims
72 July 2026