Online criminals beyond the long arm of the law, warn MPs Online fraudsters are operating with impunity from the law, according to a report by MPs, who warn the UK is losing the war on internet crime. According to the paper by the home affairs select committee, a large amount of low-level fraud is being carried out without any pursuit of those to blame. Instead, banks are simply reimbursing customers and ignoring the problem. Keith Vaz, Labour chair of the committee, said: "We are not winning the war on online criminal activity. We are being too complacent about these e-wars because the victims are hidden in cyberspace. The committee found that low-level criminals can make "huge profits" with the scale of their operations. RSA, a cybersecurity firm, told the committee it had found online fraudsters offering access to credit card details, networks of hacked computers and other fraud "services" through Facebook, the social network site. The report said this was evidence of widespread online crime that is going unpunished. The committee wants banks to be forced to report all online crime to law enforcement agencies. Adrian Leppard, the City of London police commissioner, said: "We are not winning [the war on e-crime]. I do not think we are winning globally and I think this nature of crime is rising exponentially. The warning comes as companies pay increasing amounts of attention to the security of their online systems. One estimate suggests the UK loses £27bn a year because of e-crime, although the committee called that figure into question, arguing that it was based on faulty assumptions. Government agencies are concerned about the scale of the problem, however. Security chiefs recently took the step of writing to the chairmen of the UK's largest quoted companies asking them to check their online safety systems. The committee was critical of several elements of how both government policy and the criminal justice system treat such crimes. It pointed out that hackers who attacked PayPal, costing the payments company £3.5m, were given sentences of seven and 18 months. The report said: "We do not believe they would have received such sentences had they physically robbed a bank of £3.5m." The committee also looked at the problem of child safety online, and criticised ministers for cutting the budget of the Child Exploitation and Online Protection Centre by 10 per cent. The report said: "It is still too easy for people to access inappropriate online content, particularly indecent images of children, terrorism incitement and sites informing people how to commit online crime." The warning comes days after David Cameron urged internet companies to do more to stop child pornography. The prime minister did not pledge any more money to help tackle the problem. They called on the UK to support an increase in funding to the European cybercrime centre, something likely to prove controversial among eurosceptic MPs. The Home Office said: "Crime is at record low levels and this government is taking action to tackle the cyber threat, investing more than £850m through the national cyber security programme to develop and maintain cutting-edge capabilities."