UK bank scam attempts rise 62% as fraudsters shift tactics

Attempted social engineering scams at UK banks rose 62% in 2025, according to BioCatch data covering more than 100 million retail banking accounts at nine UK lenders.

The fraud specialist said the increase reflects a broader shift towards authorised fraud, with criminals focusing more on manipulating customers than on older account-takeover methods.

Its report found that purchase scams rose 63%, romance scams 47% and investment scams 34% over the year. Phishing attempts more than doubled, up 140%, while fraud linked to stolen devices jumped 112%.

By contrast, remote-access fraud and malware-related fraud both declined, suggesting some traditional attack routes are becoming less prominent as banks tighten controls and criminals adapt.

Reported mule accounts also increased 16%, which may reflect both the continued spread of mule networks and stronger detection by banks.

Fraud shift

The findings add to evidence that customer behaviour has become a central point of vulnerability for banks. Authorised fraud, in which victims are persuaded to approve payments or grant access themselves, has become a persistent concern for lenders, regulators and law enforcement in the UK.

Tom Peacock, director of global fraud intelligence at BioCatch, said the rise in scam activity reflected a longer-term change in tactics.

“The continued growth of social engineering scams in the UK likely surprises no one. As banks bolstered their controls to protect customers from third-party fraud, fraudsters mastered the art of social engineering and haven’t looked back. Our data shows substantial increases in attempts across many scam types in 2025, highlighting just how pervasive authorised fraud has become in the UK,” Peacock said.

The report also highlighted the use of stolen mobile phones and other devices. BioCatch linked the sharp increase in stolen-device fraud to weaknesses that emerge when criminals gain control of a trusted handset already used for digital banking.

Jonathan Frost, global advisory director at BioCatch, pointed to crime data and insurance claims as evidence of the scale of the problem.

“In London alone, Metropolitan Police data shows us more than 70,000 phones were reported stolen in 2025. Insurance industry data shows the UK makes up 40% of all stolen device claims across Europe. If these devices are not well secured, criminals can profit in two ways: They can either sell the device or use it to commit fraud by bypassing normal security checks. Those criminals who do both will see significant gains for relatively little risk. Stolen devices undermine strong customer authentication. To address this, financial institutions should continuously assess behavioural intent, because once a bad actor has control of a trusted device, they can often commit fraud with relatively little friction,” Frost said.

Industry response

The report also raises questions about whether the response from the industry and regulators is keeping pace with changing fraud methods. The debate has become more urgent as banks invest more in fraud controls while criminals shift towards techniques that rely less on technical intrusion and more on impersonation, coercion and deception.

Katy Worobec, director at Azymus Consilium Fraud Consultancy and former managing director of economic crime at UK Finance, said tackling the problem depended on identifying threats earlier and improving intelligence sharing.

“Winning the battle against fraud ultimately rests on the ability to identify and disarm the enemy at an early stage. Collation and exchange of intelligence between trusted allies is vital … Individual technologies and tools at the vendor level play their part too, gleaning information from the enemy by stealth, identifying behaviours, patterns, and signals that indicate whether transactions and interactions with organisations are genuine,” Worobec said.

The study was based on proprietary data from BioCatch customer institutions in the region. It also includes analysis of deepfakes in digital onboarding, highlighting another route through which identity checks may come under pressure as synthetic media tools become easier to use.

The latest figures suggest UK banks are making progress against some legacy forms of account compromise, but are still contending with fast-growing scam methods built around persuasion, impersonation and access to trusted devices.

Across the nine banks in the study, attempted social engineering scams, phishing and stolen-device fraud all rose sharply in the same year that malware and remote-access fraud declined.