Thousands hit by tax credit ID fraud

The government has been accused of trying to hush up the true scale of tax credit ID fraud with details now emerging that thousands of benefits staff at the Department of Work and Pensions (DWP) have had their details stolen and used by criminals to make fraudulent claims.

The HM Revenue and Customs tax credits website for making online claims was closed down on 5 December when compliance checks uncovered the ID fraud. The DWP initially said around 1,500 of its staff had been targeted by the fraudsters who used the stolen personal details to make false tax credit claims.

If just one man can defraud the system of at least £1.3m, it's anyone's guess as to how much organised criminal gangs are getting away with.

-- David Laws, Liberal Democrat shadow work and pensions secretary

But MPs have hit out at the government after the DWP admitted this week that thousands of job centre staff have had their IDs stolen by the fraudsters.

The DWP will not publicly comment on the number of staff affected or how the details were stolen while the criminal investigation is ongoing but a spokeswoman told silicon.com the victims all appear to come from the 13,000 job centre workers for the London region.

Opposition MPs fear the true scale of tax credit fraud could be huge, especially given the prosecution of a single fraudster for almost £1.3m of false claims.

Liberal Democrat shadow work and pensions secretary David Laws said in a statement: "If just one man can defraud the system of at least £1.3m, it's anyone's guess as to how much organised criminal gangs are getting away with.

"The Government must stop trying to hush up the scale of tax credit fraud. We need an urgent independent review into the real scale of the problem."

Conservative shadow economic secretary Mark Francois said the security checks for claiming tax credits are insufficient with fraudsters able to make false claims by getting hold of just someone's name, date of birth and national insurance number.