SCOTLAND faces a “fraud epidemic” as the number of incidents rocket with police struggling to solve just one in six cases, Scottish Labour has warned.

New figures published by the Scottish government show that the number of frauds reported to Police Scotland jumped by a staggering 140 per cent between 2014-15 and 2023-24, from 6,913 to 16,624.

The surge appears largely driven by online crime, which now makes up 59 per cent of all reported fraud, a share that trebled in between 2019 and 2024.