The Fraud Act 2006: The E-Crime Prosecutor's Champion or the Creator of a New Inchoate Offence?

Abstract

After a considerable gestation period, the Fraud Act 2006 came into force on 15th January 2007. The introduction of general offences is intended to provide scope to ensure that technologically focused crime can be targeted. However, whilst the sentiments behind the new Act are to be welcomed, it is argued that there are a number of deficiencies in the new Act, which could lead to considerable problems. First, although the Act shifts focus away from deception problems (notably that deception of a machine or computer is not legally possible) it moves towards the concept of dishonesty, which is problematic in itself as there already exists a number of criticisms relating to this concept. Second, there are problems with a failure of the Act to provide for specific definitions of key concepts, such as ‘fraud’, ‘false’ or ‘abuse’. Third, and arguably most importantly, under the new Act the liability-threshold for fraud shifts; fraud is no longer a result crime, but a conduct crime. This has the advantage of the law stepping in at an early stage to prevent further criminality; although at the same time potentially provides a completely new concept of the criminal act of fraud.