To ask the Secretary of State for the Home Department what recent estimate he has made of the cost to public funds of computer assisted fraud; and if he will make a statement. (105252)

This information is not held centrally and collecting it would involve disproportionate costs.

Most recent credible figure for the cost of fraud comes from research by consultants National Economic Research Associates (NERA) published in 2000.

This estimated fraud to cost the public sector a total of £4.1 billion-£9.3 billion in 1998-99. It did not, however, separately identify computer-assisted fraud.