The 3rd TECAs Thought Leadership Summit, sponsored by Themis and organised in association with the UK Fraud Forum, takes place on Tuesday 4th November 2025 at the Royal Lancaster, London.
This year’s Summit is set to shine a spotlight on the UK’s evolving fight against fraud and economic crime. Designed to drive collaboration, spark innovation, and inspire strategic reform, the event brings together leading voices from law enforcement, academia, and industry. Together they will explore the most pressing challenges in fraud prevention and financial crime, and the bold solutions shaping the future
The event will create networking opportunities and an environment that promotes the sharing of best practice amongst attendees and encourages debate and participation with speakers.
TECAs Thought Leadership Programme:
11:30 Registration and exhibition
12:15 Networking lunch
13:15 Thought Leadership Summit
Welcome and introduction
Professor Martin Gill, Perpetuity Research
James Gliddon, UK Fraud Forum
13:40 – 14.10 : Our Future Vision: Three Big Shifts in the Partnership Response to Economic and Cybercrime
Nik Adams – Deputy Commissioner, City of London Police
This presentation will examine the recent progress the City of London Police (as lead for economic and cyber crime) has made in tackling economic crime, highlighting significant milestones achieved over the past year. It will outline three strategic priorities guiding the national response to fraud, economic and cyber crime in England and Wales. These include delivering prevention at scale, ensuring that fraud criminals are denied access to money and assets, and strengthening the overall policing response. By focusing on these areas, the session will provide insight into how policing is adapting to evolving threats, shaping its strategy, and working to protect the public and economy from the growing impact of economic crime.
Nik Adams was appointed as Deputy Commissioner to oversee the City of London Police’s Economic and Cyber Crime Directorates in December 2024, having transferred to the City of London Police in March 2022 as Commander for Economic and Cyber Crime. As Deputy Commissioner, Nik is focussed on national delivery, which includes Action Fraud and the National Fraud Intelligence Bureau. He oversees the national Economic and Cyber Crime Academy and a diverse range of operational units within the City of London Police. These units tackle complex and specialist aspects of economic crime, and include partnership units specialising in intellectual property crime, insurance fraud and payment crime. He is additionally the NPCC lead for the Financial Investigation, and the NPCC lead for Elections. The City of London Police is the lead force for Economic crime and the policing lead for Cyber Crime, delivering national services such as Action Fraud and the National Fraud Intelligence Bureau, which incorporates the Economic Crime Victim Care Unit.
14:10 – 14:40 : The Business Fraud Alliance
Jonathan Holmes and Lee Fitzgerald, trustees of the Fraud Advisory Panel International
The Business Fraud Alliance, led by the Fraud Advisory Panel and sponsored by Barclays Corporate Banking, is a campaign designed to unite cross-sector knowledge and expertise in tackling fraud and wider economic crime. It provides a platform for leading voices from business, law enforcement, and policy to share insights on emerging risks and practical solutions. Speakers will reflect on the evolution of fraud prevention, exploring how lessons learned from the past can shape stronger responses for the future. Central to the discussion is the value of collaboration: demonstrating why sharing information, data, and knowledge across sectors remains one of the most powerful tools available in the fight against fraud.
Jonathan Holmes is a partner at PricewaterhouseCoopers LLP. He specialises in fraud and integrity investigations, disputes, and contentious contract matters across a wide range of industries, sectors and jurisdictions, including the United States, Europe, Hong Kong and South Korea. He has significant experience advising on complex, high-profile issues, and was previously seconded to the Financial Conduct Authority (FCA), where he worked on the investigation into Payment Protection Insurance (PPI). Jonathan is also a trustee of the Fraud Advisory Panel.
Lee Fitzgerald is the Fraud Risk Strategy Director for Barclays International and is responsible for end-to-end fraud management for its UK Corporate Bank, Private Bank & Wealth Management and Investment Bank. Prior to Barclays, Lee was Head of Fraud for NatWest Corporate and Private Bank where she held numerous fraud roles within her career.
14:40 – 15.10 : Fraud, Failure and Fixes: Making Sense of the Economic Crime Act
Dr Rasha Kassem – Senior Lecturer, Aston University
This session explores the new “failure to prevent fraud” offence introduced by the Economic Crime and Corporate Transparency Act 2023 – a landmark development in corporate liability. It examines what this means for organisations, how to assess fraud risk, and what “reasonable procedures” may look like in practice. The session also considers potential gaps in the law, sector-specific challenges, and implications for enforcement. With practical insights and cross-sector examples, it aims to support legal, compliance, and risk professionals in moving from reactive compliance to proactive fraud prevention – and preparing for a new era of corporate accountability.
Dr Rasha Kassem is a Senior Lecturer and the Leader of the Fraud Research Group at Aston University in the UK. With over 19 years of experience in higher education and research, she specialises in counter-fraud, forensic accounting, auditing, and governance. Her research encompasses all dimensions of fraud, targeting individuals and organisations across the private, public, and voluntary sectors. Beyond her academic role, Dr Kassem is a Certified Fraud Examiner and a Consultant on Insider Fraud at Cifas. She is an active member of the Anti-Corruption PRME Group, the ACFE Advisory Council in the USA, and the UK government cross-sector advisory group of the counter-fraud profession.
COMFORT BREAK (15 mins)
15.25 – 15.55 : Behind Closed Doors: Housing Fraud and Organised Crime Uncovered
Dr Janice Goldstraw-White – Economic Crime Researcher, Perpetuity Research
Allan Maund – Financial Crime and Insurance Manager, Bromford Housing
This presentation explores housing fraud and other financial crimes linked to properties across both the private rented sector (PRS) and the housing association sector. It highlights the distinct challenges faced within each sector as well as the shared vulnerabilities exploited by criminals. The session will also examine how housing fraud is increasingly linked to wider criminality, including organised crime groups involved in fraud and other crimes. By comparing trends, methods, and data insights, the presentation will identify opportunities for cross-sector collaboration, innovation, and policy reform to strengthen prevention and detection efforts and disrupt criminal networks within the housing system.
Janice is a criminologist specialising in economic crime, with research interests spanning fraudster behaviour, the role of women in fraud, organised crime, and broader security issues. She leads Perpetuity Research’s work on economic crime and contributes to studies on wider areas of criminality and security. Janice previously worked in finance across both the public and private sectors. Her extensive research – conducted in the UK, Australia and beyond – focuses on practical and policy solutions to fraud. She is widely published and the author of White-Collar Crime: Accounts of Offending Behaviour, based on her PhD research involving interviews with 50 convicted fraudsters.
Allan is a strategic, commercially minded leader with significant experience in financial crime prevention, compliance, and risk management across housing, consultancy, and financial services. Since 1994, he has led global investigations and teams and currently heads the financial crime and insurance functions at Bromford Flagship. Allan has delivered transformative programmes, including a new financial crime framework that tripled referrals and property recoveries in three years. Known for building high-performing teams, managing multi-million-pound budgets, and influencing senior stakeholders, Allan drives operational excellence through data-led decisions, strong governance, and a relentless focus on positive outcomes.
15:55 – 16:20 : AI & Financial Crime
Henry Wyard – Senior Policy Analyst – Themis
Both financial & economic crime and our response to the threats it poses are being significantly reshaped by artificial intelligence technologies. In order to ensure that the power of AI developments is used for good, it is essential that we understand how they interact with and affect existing features of the economic crime landscape. This session aims to foster a grounded understanding of AI’s function in contemporary economic crime through discussion of the economic crime data landscape, trends in criminal use of AI technology and the integration of AI in responses to economic crime
Henry Wyard, Senior Policy Analyst, leads the AI stream of Themis’s financial crime policy research and risk intelligence practice. He works with public and private sector organisations to deliver strategic advisory on how artificial intelligence can combat illicit finance threats, including those emerging from criminal usage of AI, and is a member of Themis’s technology R&D team, where he provides guidance for the development of novel AI applications in anti-financial crime.
16:20 Closing remarks
16:30 Afternoon tea – networking/exhibition
17:00 Close
TECAs awards dinner will follow at 18:45.
Tickets:
£99 + VAT – to include networking lunch, exhibition, Summit, and afternoon refreshments
£495 + VAT – Exhibition Stand (inc. 2 summit tickets) – Table-top exhibition stand space is available for those organisations wishing to promote their products and services to a wide audience of economic crime professionals