Current Partnerships

In terms of the importance around partnerships, the PDWP have identified and developed strong working relationships with a number of organisations across the Cyber landscape in terms of law enforcement, public, private, and third sector partners.

In harnessing these close working partnerships, Police Scotland is looking for ways to work more collaboratively and seamlessly together, whilst breaking down any remaining divisions that may exist across the public, private and the voluntary sector. With the common enemy of the cyber-criminal we recognise the formidable force we become, when we pull together our resources and expertise.

Cyber Scotland/Cyber and Fraud Centre (Scotland)

One of Police Scotland’s key areas of collaboration in cyber is the Cyber Scotland Partnership. The Cyber Scotland Partnership is a collaborative leadership approach to focus efforts on improving cyber resilience across Scotland. The Scottish Governments key strategic stakeholders come together in a formal partnership arrangement to drive the delivery of activities that will achieve the outcomes of the Strategic Framework for a Cyber Resilient Scotland.

A key member within the Cyber Scotland Partnership is the Cyber and Fraud Centre (formerly SBRC). Their vision is to make Scotland one of the safest and most resilient places to live, work and run a business. They offer a range of services and guidance to people and businesses in the Prevent/Protect categories while educating and training those to become more resilient and better prepared to mitigate future cyber threats.

Scottish Cyber Co-ordination Centre (SC3)

SC3 was announced at Cyber Scotland Week in February 2022 and will seek to become a recognised, authoritative and collaborative function to combat the accelerating threat of cyber-attacks to Scotland, its businesses and people. The intention is to leverage better coordination and collaboration for the common benefit and so prevent and respond to escalating cyber risk in a more rapid and resilient way. SC3 will not seek to replace the National Cyber Resilience Centre or existing resilience structures. SC3 will collaborate with key stakeholders from Police Scotland , NHS National Systems Support, Hefestes (Education), Scottish Government (SG) I Techs and Digital Office (Local Authority) in delivering the mission of improving Scotland’s capabilities to defend against, and be resilient to, the cyber threat. The co-ordination of this work formed part of the year one year discovery phase.

A Head of Centre (HOC) is to be appointed in due course and key work stream leads have been appointed and structures established to contribute and provide strategic direction for SC3 moving forward. The SC3 brand will be created along with on boarding of key partners who will support and assist in the development of the 5 key work-streams. In support of this activity, it is understood that a communications plan will be developed leading up to further SC3 milestones during Cyber Security month in October 2023.

NPCC Digital Forensic Portfolio

The vision of this business area is to improve operations through national oversight and coordination. In order to achieve this the portfolio will focus on key areas which align to and mirror PDWP objectives:

Improve systems inter-operability and align with national programmes. Harness technological change and opportunities through effective partnership working.

Meeting the data challenge through streamlining data management.

Developing the workforce for consistency of standards and approach.

Building trust and new robust capabilities

Shared learning and collaboration through research and development.

Fraud Multi-Agency Hub

Fraud is synonymous with online crime and over the last 5 years this has seen a 68% increase, equating to an average of 1500 crimes per month, 95% of which is online. The policing response to these crime types has used 400,000 of investigation hours in the past 5 years. 

ACC Andy Freeburn, as Chair of the Strategic Fraud Governance Group with partners from Scottish Government, the banking and financial sector and the Cyber and Fraud Centre Scotland, have commenced a multi-agency triage hub pilot, with the objective of ensuring that the public and private sector work more collaboratively to tackle and prevent this escalating threat.

The group meet on a weekly/monthly basis and report into the Fraud Strategic Governance Group, chaired by ACC Freeburn and has already achieved success in stopping live online offending and recovering victim’s financial losses.     

UK Fraud Strategy Alignment/Fraud and Cyber Crime Reporting and Analysis Service (FCCRAS)

In terms of the wider UK approach, Police Scotland are also working closely with the City of London Police and assisting in the development of the new Fraud and Cyber Crime Reporting and Analysis Service (FCCRAS), formerly known as Action Fraud. Police Scotland are not currently a member of this service, however are considering this position in light of the new developments.

The new FCCRAS has been designed with the following collective objectives for both the victim and law enforcement:

Improved victim experience and satisfaction.

Lead to criminal justice outcomes.

Prevent crime and reduce harm.

Contribute to an improved understanding of the threat from serious and organised crime.

Improve systems inter-operability and align with national programmes.

This supports our alignment to the recently published UK Fraud Strategy, which outlines key actions across the following pillars:

Pursue Fraudsters.

Block Fraud.

Empower People.

A Fraud co-ordination group is being established to coordinate all Fraud related activity in Police Scotland, to develop a national approach.