Huge VAT fraud tab eclipses EU's age-old scams
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'Something must be done,' MEPs thunder Carousel and VAT fraud is far outstripping Europeans' traditional financial fiddles on EU funds, prompting MEPs to call on the European Commission to overhaul its anti-fraud operation to combat the problem.â¦
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Mobile firms feel pain yet again Europe's highest court has ruled that the huge amounts telcos paid for their 3G licences didn't include VAT, so there's no opportunity for the companies to reclaim Â£3.3bn quid from the treasury.â¦
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The inside story of Parmalat, the biggest, most brazen corporate fraud in European history
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French bank Societe Generale said Thursday it has uncovered a 4.9 billion euro ($7.14 billion) fraud Â one of history's biggest Â by a single futures trader whose scheme of fictitious transactions was discovered as stock markets began to stumble in recent days.
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Red tape vs Redmond...the never ending story The European Commission has hit back at suggestions it has got it in for Microsoft over security features built into the heavily-delayed Windows Vista.â¦
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Software on the Seine, anyone? Backup in Budapest? VTL from Vienna? And why not. Europeans have far more experience when it comes to dealing with data regulatory issues than we do.
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TEN men, including a Cheshire businessman, have been arrested by Customs officers investigating a suspected pounds 250m "carousel" VAT fraud.   They are believed to be part of a sophisticated network of companies that "carouselled" large quantities of mobile phones.
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The FTSE 100 on Thursday shrugged off news of a EU5bn fraud at Soci&eacute;t&eacute; G&eacute;n&eacute;rale to move sharply higher.
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(InfoWorld) - In a surprise move, the European Commission said Wednesday it is shelving plans to overhaul Europeâs rules on copyright fees, after intense lobbying from France and from groups representing artists and authors. The Commission, the executive body of the European Union, was planning to replace the patchwork of national rules with a Europe-wide code designed to better suit the digital age. Presently most countries impose copyright levies on a wide range of products, from photocopiers to mobile phones, and including recordable formats such as CD-Rs, blank cassettes and even paper. The size of levies varies widely from country to country. Only the U.K., Ireland, and Luxembourg do not impose any such levies. Copyright levies are supposed to compensate artists and authors who donât receive any payment when their copyrighted music, documents, or pictures are duplicated by consumers. The Commission wanted to harmonize the rules and scrap levies on most hardware. Its aim was to reduce the fees, which in some cases increase the price of goods dramatically. For example, in Spain consumers have to pay almost â¬300 ($398) in levies when they buy an 80GB MP3 player; in Austria the equivalent charge is just â¬8, according to the Copyright Levies Reform Alliance (CLRA), a coalition of businesses dedicated to harmonizing and lowering copyright fees in Europe. The Commission said it was abandoning the rule change for now. It had planned to publish a proposal before the end of this year. âMore reflection is needed on this complex issue,â spokeswoman Pia AhrenKilde Hansen told journalists. She wouldnât give a new timetable for the legal proposal. She acknowledged that the French prime minister Dominique de Villepin had written to the Commission earlier this month, urging it to drop the plan but she insisted that the Commission will decide for itself when the proposal will be launched. The Commission has been planning to harmonize copyright levies across the E.U. since 2000. Since then the case for scrapping most levies has grown stronger. Digital rights management software, which allows copyright owners to track the copying of their works, has become commonplace. The Commissionâs climb down sparked an angry reaction from the companies and industry groups pushing for a change to the system. âEuropean industry is deeply disturbed by the European Commissionâs apparent about-face on the planned reform of copyright levies,â said Mark McGann, spokesman for the CLRA in a statement issued Wednesday. âWith this decision, it is clear to industry that the Commission has abandoned any serious efforts to establish transparency, efficiency and fairness in the way these levies are set, collected and distributed,â he added, warning that without the revamp of copyright levies, several large European companies now intend to file official complaints with the Commission that will likely result in a wave of infringement procedures against certain member states. âThe reform of copyright levies would then move from the European executive to the European Court of Justice,â CLRA said in its statement.
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Tens of millions of pounds have been overpaid through benefit errors or fraud, according to a new report.
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Further savings expected for public sector The UK government has smashed its previous record for cost savings achieved from a reverse e-auctionâ¦
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Mobile phone operators face a new attack on their revenue in Europe after the UK telecoms regulator expressed concern about "extremely high" prices paid by consumers and business people for web surfing on their mobiles while abroad.
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The UK loses five times more money to VAT cheats than any other EU country, a report claims.
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HMRC promises light touch for honest late starters Traders in a broad range of electronic goods have three months to overhaul their systems ahead of a VAT shakeup designed to crack down on missing trader fraud.â¦
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People selling items over the internet or through newspaper adverts are warned of a sophisticated fraudulent payment scam.
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Crackdown on online fraud produces more than 100 legal actions in Europe, Middle East.
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Bounty should go to a good home, says report The UK is missing out on more than Â£1bn in lost taxes and the creation of over 13,000 new high-paying jobs over four years if we all took software piracy more seriously, according to a new report.â¦