Plastic card fraud, which involves the compromise of any personal information from credit, debit or store cards, hit 37.73% of all UK identity theft cases in 2024, with 94,111 victims caught in the scam.
There are other types of fraud vulnerability, since smartphone companies saw a 72.72% rise in fraud cases, with criminals targeting 36,453 victims in 2024.
To add to these, there is also asset finance fraud, which is where someone pays themself with a fake invoice, fell by 80.09%, with cases dropping from 7,837 to just 1,560.
Plastic card fraud stands as the top scam for identity thieves targeting Brits, new research shows. The scam now makes up more than a third of all identity theft cases across the UK.
The study, conducted by GBG, analysed Cifas data to identify fraud patterns across different business sectors, including banking, insurance, and telecommunications, between 2023 and 2024.
The sectors most affected by identity fraud
| Rank | Sector | Cases (2024) | Percentage of all cases | Change from 2023 |
| 1. | Plastic card | 94,111 | 37.73% | +8.71% |
| 2. | Bank account | 57,944 | 23.23% | +4.86% |
| 3. | Communications | 36,453 | 14.62% | +72.72% |
| 4. | Online retail | 18,581 | 7.45% | -25.41% |
| 5. | Loan | 15,631 | 6.27% | -13.28% |
| 6. | Insurance | 13,108 | 5.26% | +6.87% |
| 7. | Credit file/ Identity services | 9,359 | 3.75% | -8.05% |
| 8. | Other | 2,281 | 0.91% | +90.08% |
| 9. | Asset finance | 1,560 | 0.63% | -80.09% |
| 10. | Public sector services | 300 | 0.12% | +14.50% |
As indicated above, payment card fraud affected 94,111 victims throughout 2024. This was an increase of 8.71% from the 86,572 cases the year before. Plastic card fraud is the most common identity theft tactic used by criminals operating in Britain today. This type of fraud isn’t limited to credit cards, it can involve credit, debit or store cards.
Bank account fraud took second place with 57,944 cases as of the most recently available 2024 data. The numbers grew 4.86% from the 55,256 victims in the previous year. Bank account fraud accounts for nearly a one in four of all identity scams reported across the UK.
Phone companies suffered the biggest surge as fraud cases exploded by 72.72%, rising from 21,105 in 2023 to 36,453 in 2024.
After this, online shopping saw good news as fraud fell by 25.41%, dropping from 24,911 cases to 18,581 over the same period. This decline pushed online retail down one spot to fifth place in the identity fraud league table.
Asset finance recorded the most dramatic improvement with cases plummeting by 80.09%, tumbling from 7,837 incidents to just 1,560 in a single year. The massive drop suggests anti-fraud measures in this sector have proven effective at stopping criminals.
Insurance fraud ticked up slightly by 6.87%, with 13,108 cases in 2024 compared to 12,265 the previous year. Loan providers fared better with fraud dropping 13.28% as cases fell from 18,024 to 15,631.
The “other” category makes up less than 1% of all identity fraud but saw the biggest percentage jump at 90.08%, with cases increasing from 1,200 to 2,281. Total identity fraud across all sectors rose 4.94%, with 249,417 victims in 2024 compared to 237,682 in 2023.
Mortgage fraud remains extremely rare compared to other types of scams. The study found just 30 cases in 2024, making up a tiny 0.01% of all identity fraud. This figure shows a small drop of 6.25% from 32 cases recorded in 2023.
