Police urge firms to share e-crime details

The Metropolitan Police is urging companies to come forward and share intelligence to help fight cyber-crime.

Speaking at the Computer and Internet Crime conference in London, Tarique Ghaffur, assistant commissioner of the Metropolitan Police, stressed the need for police and industry to share intelligence if they were to identify current and future criminal trends.

Describing cyber-criminals as "nimble", Ghaffur said: "Cyber-crime is a global issue but London is a significant nexus point.

"The police have huge intelligence gaps. Industry must share intelligence and information about attacks and their losses. The latest scams need to be communicated."

The Met Police says it will ensure that details of companies who come forward will be kept confidential.

Although welcoming recent proposals to revise the 1990 Computer Misuse Act (CMA) to clarify the illegality of attacks such as distributed denial of service, Ghaffur warned that a highly regulated regime would be unhelpful.

"We need clarity; the proposed amendments to the CMA are good and jurisdiction [issues] are being addressed [and] we need to address the loss of data, but I am a believer in self regulation," he said.

Ghaffur also suggested that cyber-crime had yet to catch the attention of politicians. "Sadly it is still not high on the political agenda. We need political support to tackle cyber-crime," he said.