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Dating hot spot to fraud hot spot: Targeting the social characteristics of romance fraud victims in England and Wales

Richard Sinclair ; Matthew Bland ; Bradley Savage (2023) — Criminology & Public Policy

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DOI: 10.1111/1745-9133.12629 (opens in a new tab)

Type:   Journal Article
Country:   United Kingdom
Tags:   Acorn Segmentation, Action Fraud, AI-Enabled Fraud, Cross Cultural, England And Wales, Evidence Based Policing, Geodemographic Segmentation, Geographic Hot Spots, Law Enforcement, Platform Policy, Prevention, Romance Scams, Victim Demographics, Victim Experience
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Synopsis

            
The study extracted three years (13 October 2018-12 October 2021) of Action Fraud records coded as romance fraud (NFIB1D). After excluding non-England/Wales, invalid-address, and duplicate records, it analyzed 15,575 victims. Victim postcodes were matched to Acorn commercial geodemographic classifications, aggregated to outward postcodes, and ranked to identify hot spots (three or more victims annually). After three years, 162 chronic outward postcodes contained 17% of all reported romance-fraud victims, while 157 secondary postcodes contained another 10%; hot spots were more frequently less affluent communities. The authors conclude that nationwide blanket prevention campaigns are unlikely to be the most efficient approach for romance fraud. Action Fraud records are self-reported, mostly submitted online, and often unchecked unless investigated; reports may therefore be inaccurate, false, miscoded, or omit romance-fraud victims.

          

        
                  

            
Identified Gaps

            
Geographic patterns in cybercrime victimization are under-studied, and research on romance-fraud victim characteristics has often used small, self-selected and unverified victim samples. The authors also note limited evidence on what demographics are common among victims and on the effectiveness of locally tailored prevention strategies.

          

        
                  

            
Methods

            
The study extracted three years (13 October 2018–12 October 2021) of Action Fraud records coded as romance fraud (NFIB1D). After excluding non-England/Wales, invalid-address, and duplicate records, it analyzed 15,575 victims. Victim postcodes were matched to Acorn commercial geodemographic classifications, aggregated to outward postcodes, and ranked to identify hot spots (three or more victims annually). Year-to-year recurrence identified chronic and secondary hot spots; ArcGIS mapping and descriptive comparisons examined segmentation patterns and prevention-access differences.

          

        
                  

            
Limitations

            
Action Fraud records are self-reported, mostly submitted online, and often unchecked unless investigated; reports may therefore be inaccurate, false, miscoded, or omit romance-fraud victims. The data cover only people who recognized and reported victimization, so underreporting limits representativeness. The study analyzed absolute counts rather than population rates. Acorn is a proprietary “black box”; its classifications may not match individual victims, rely partly on older census data, forecasting, samples, and statistical estimates, and could not be fully validated by the researchers.

          

        
                  

            
Future Work

            
Test household-level targeting and combine underlying victim demographics with segmentation data. Replicate the method across other fraud, cybercrime, and traditional crime types. Integrate dating-platform data to compare hot spots with users and test bespoke prevention messages through experiments or qualitative user research.

          

              

    
    

        
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