UK’s National Crime Agency, responsible for tackling cybercrime, ‘on its knees’, report warns

The National Crime Agency (NCA), once hailed as UK law enforcement’s elite answer to the challenges posed by serious and organised crime, including cybercrime, is “on its knees”, a new report has found.

The agency is suffering from a critical “brain drain” with senior and experienced staff leaving in large numbers, Monday’s Spotlight on Corruption report warned, raising particular concern that the NCA is losing “almost a fifth of its cyber capacity each year”.

Such a high number of vacancies – which the report says is caused by a flawed pay system – has had a domino effect of increasing costs even more than a significant pay increase, as the agency has been forced to hire temporary workers and consultants who now account for more than 10% of its budget.

The report called on the government to urgently reform the agency and invest sufficiently: “Now is a critical juncture. If the NCA is to deliver on its mission to protect the UK from hostile threats, fraud and corruption, and serious organised crime more generally, then major reforms are needed, particularly on pay and conditions.”

Britain’s new Labour government campaigned in this year’s general election on improving the state of the public sector, which has faced a series of challenges and funding shortages following the 2008 financial crisis and subsequent austerity measures by the Conservative Party.

“Like other public sector workers, NCA officials’ pay has stagnated after a decade of public sector pay freezes and has been eroded by high inflation since 2022,” the report said. “The question for the new government is not whether it can afford to invest in NCA wage reform, but whether it can afford not to.”

Lessons from the FBI

Spotlight on Corruption, a civil society non-profit, acknowledged that while “the NCA’s pay issues are not unique within the public sector, for an agency charged with protecting the public … the consequences of not addressing (these issues) are potentially catastrophic.”

Although the NCA is sometimes described as the FBI of Britain, although its powers and role within UK law enforcement differ slightly, there are significant differences between the agencies.

“Being an FBI agent is a highly desirable career path for state and local law enforcement officers who are motivated by the agency’s mission to combat crime, but who are also attracted to the agency because of its attractive pay and benefits and enhanced opportunities for professional growth,” the report said.

It pointed to the FBI’s “extraordinarily low” staff turnover of just 1.7% by 2023 and the disparity in pay between FBI agents and their British counterparts: “The FBI’s starting salary is just £12,759 ($16,700) less than the £77,559 ($101,500) paid to a senior manager at the NCA’s highest rank for officers.”

In contrast, serving police officers in Britain “would have to accept a pay cut and reduced benefits to join the NCA” and there are no similar annual “within grade” pay increases to recognise performance.

For a penny

The growth of online commerce and connectivity since 2008 has been accompanied by an increase in cybercrime, including online fraud. Fraud now accounts for almost 40% of all reported crime in the UK, with more than half of this carried out online.

Law enforcement officials say tackling this will require more than just funding their own agencies. As the NCA’s National Economic Crime Centre told parliament, more funding is needed for the entire criminal justice system.

But the level of criminality the NCA has to deal with is particularly scandalous. Parliament’s Joint Committee on National Security concluded in its own inquiry into the ransomware threat that the NCA “lacked sufficient resources and capabilities to deal with the scale of the challenge.”

While the NCA has had some notable successes in tackling ransomware since that investigation — most notably by disrupting LockBit — the agency’s director general, Graeme Biggar, acknowledged at a press conference in London: “If we had more resources, we could do more.”

A government spokesman said: “The National Crime Agency plays a vital role in tackling organised crime gangs, and this government is committed to investing in the National Crime Agency and its people to ensure it has the capacity and capability to tackle the growing threats.”

Although the Spotlight on Corruption report did not mention the problem of small boat crossings in the English Channel, the agency has become the focus of the new government’s efforts to tackle the crisis. Six children and a pregnant woman were among 12 who died last week attempting the crossing from France.

The spokesperson added: “Last month we announced 100 extra National Crime Agency officers who will be working with partners across Europe to tackle criminal smuggling gangs making dangerous crossings in small boats. This is in addition to a 50% increase in the number of NCA officers based at Europol.”