BOLTON has been named as one of the worst internet fraud hot spots in the country.

Researchers probing organised crime have published a map of the worst UK towns and cities for online crime.

And from all the postcodes across the UK, Bolton’s BL code is one of just a handful to show up red on the map — indicating areas where the problem is bad.

It shows that for at least every 200 transactions carried out by someone in Bolton online, one of them will be illegal.

Experts call these “bad transactions”.

Bad transactions saw criminals across the UK net £85 million in the 12 months leading up to the end of July.

One common swindle starts when fraudsters get their hands on stolen credit card details and then buy things online.

The goods are then delivered to an address before being swiftly shipped elsewhere.

Once card holders realise their card has been used fraudulently, they report it to police. Their credit card company then reclaims the cash from the firms where the goods came from.

Another illegal scheme involves putting up goods for auction online before pocketing the cash and failing to deliver.

In March, Jason Hart, aged 33, of Farnworth, was jailed for two years for cheating 28 eBay customers out of £23,500 in this way.

Fraud specialist Andrew Goodwill, who carried out the study for security researchers Third Man, said: “Fraudsters show no signs of giving up.

“They know that online shopping has become big business and they try every scam imaginable to dupe retailers.

“More and more honest people are using their cards to buy over the internet, but unfortunately, more and more fraudsters are also upping their game.”

He added: “Many retailers have better fraud detection and prevention systems in place, and they are working very closely together to deter the unwanted custom of single criminals and organised gangs.”

Justine Duxbury, of Bolton Trading Standards, said: “The internet has provided criminals with an opportunity to carry out crime without having person-to-person contact and more and more victims are coming to organisations like ours to make complaints.”

dale.haslam@ theboltonnews.co.uk