CON-21-190 Takedown Service · UK public procurement notice

The FCA is looking for an internet services company to provide web scanning and cybercrime disruption services in relation to investment scams that target UK consumers.

The FCA requires services that will support the FCA in its identification and take-down of websites, telephone numbers and social media accounts containing infringing content, with a particular focus on illegal financial promotions of products and services of investments or financial services. We are also looking for the third party to have strong data analytical tools that can carry out proactive monitoring and web scraping on a far reaching, speedy, industrialised basis.

Almost all firms and individuals offering, promoting or selling financial services or products in the UK have to be authorised or registered by the FCA. It is a criminal offence for an unauthorised person to carry out activities that require FCA authorisation, punishable by up to two years in prison, a fine, or both. Given the risk of serious financial harm to consumers, the promotion of such activities without authorisation is considered by the FCA to be a serious offence.

The FCA currently makes requests for websites, online ads and social media accounts to be removed on an individual basis when these are identified as containing illegal financial promotions in breach of section 21 of the Financial Services and Markets Act 2000 (“FSMA”) or which otherwise involve the carrying out, or purported carrying out, of regulated activities without FCA authorisation in breach of section 19 of FSMA. It also carries out its own proactive monitoring on internet search platforms, such as Google, Bing and Yahoo, for content which either constitutes an illegal financial promotion in breach of section 21 FSMA or which otherwise amounts to an activity which requires