The government has confirmed that it will be consulting on the role advertising can play in enabling online pension scams later in 2021.

In response to a parliamentary written question, Secretary of State for Digital, Culture, Media and Sport, Caroline Dinenage, said that her department was considering solutions to address the issue in “a cohesive and robust way”.

“The growth and scale of online pensions scams, and online fraud more broadly, is deeply concerning,” Dinenage stated.

“The government is working tirelessly with industry, regulators and consumer groups to tackle fraud.

“We are also considering additional legislative and non-legislative solutions to effectively address the harms posed by all elements of online fraud.”

Furthermore, she noted that the government was considering how online advertising is regulated through its Online Advertising Programme.

This work will look at trying to ensure that standards about the placement and content of online advertising are “effectively applied and enforced” to lessen savers’ exposure to fraudulent advertising.

Additionally, she noted this work will “look at the role advertising can play in enabling online fraud and help inform our future efforts to tackle it”.

“We will be consulting on this issue later this year,” she confirmed.

The government has been facing increased pressure to do more in tackling online pension scams, with Quilter recently writing to Prime Minister, Boris Johnson, and Dinenage, urging them to include scams in the upcoming Online Safety Bill.

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