Home Secretary launches cybercrime crack squad

Home Secretary, Jack Straw has launched a cybercrime crack squad to clamp down on organised online crime and to make the UK a safe haven to do business online.

The National Hi-Tech Crime Unit was unveiled at the Science Museum's cybercrime exhibition in London at a cost of £25 million and will employ 80 cybercrime fighters made up of law enforcers, Customs officials, businesses and IT experts.

Organised online criminal activity including paedophilia, fraud and hacking will be tackled by the new unit, the creation of which was inspired by similar preventative measures in the United States.

Speaking of the initiative Mr Straw said, "New technologies bring enormous benefits to the legitimate user, but also offer opportunities for criminals from those involved in financial fraud to paedophilia.

"We are determined that the UK will be the best and safest place in the world to conduct and engage in e-commerce and that our children receive the full protection they deserve online so they can surf the net in safety."

Bob Packham, Deputy Director General of the National Crime Squad added: "Not only do we need a multi-agency approach in the fight against cybercrime, but we also need to get businesses and the IT world on board and a lot of work has already been done in this area.

"We need to gain their trust and confidence in reporting alleged offences and I hope that now we have a co-ordinated response we will start to see the happening more and more and then we can start to build up a better picture of patterns of computer-driven criminality."

The announcement coincides with an offer on the Labour party website to order a range of egg cups lampooning senior Conservative figures. This has since come under fire from the Conservatives as it seriously cracked security advice by asking purchasers to 'send an email with all your credit card details.'

Mr Leyden, a Conservative party spokesman working in their IT department said of the offer, "Considering New Labour Home Secretary Jack Straw launched a multi-million pound Hi-Tech Crime Unit this morning, you think it might realise that it's a good idea to protect credit card information sent over the net."

Shadow Technology Minister Alan Duncan added: "This is an ignorant and highly stupid thing to do which undermines everything others have done to establish confidence in e-commerce."