Nearly a quarter of a million suspected mule accounts closed, FCA data reveals
Nearly a quarter of a million suspected money mule accounts were closed over the past year with the threat of money mules increasing, according to the Financial Conduct Authority (FCA).
FCA data shows that 238,396 suspected mule accounts were closed in 2025, up from 184,935 in 2023 and 233,269 in 2024, as criminals continue to use mule accounts to move and disguise the proceeds of crime.
The FCA found that criminals can move fraudulent funds through multiple accounts before cashing out, with proceeds often withdrawn after passing through two to five mule accounts.
By that stage, payments can be harder to detect and trace. The regulator also found that some accounts had been used repeatedly for mule activity before being closed and had also been linked to fraud, indicating established criminal infrastructure.
Dr Janet Bastiman, chief data scientist at Napier AI, commented: “Financial criminals are targeting people in their forties, who have normal looking bank history, no criminal record, and appear ordinary on paper. They’re the people that banks see as low risk and therefore won’t be scrutinised by checks.”
“If those accounts are only being checked every few years, or worse only when they’re opened, then financial criminals have free rein to launder money months before they’d ever be detected. There needs to be continuous monitoring of suspicious activity, flagging when low risk accounts suddenly start setting up lots of new payees and moving lots of money. While the FCA figures show that more mules are being uncovered, but there will be thousands more sitting in bank accounts that aren’t being checked.”
The data also points to a rise in suspected mule activity among older customers. 37,274 account closures in 2025 were linked to customers aged 40–49, up from 25,760 in 2024, representing the sharpest increase among the age groups examined. However, customers aged 26–39 accounted for the highest number of closures overall, with 91,073 in 2025.
The FCA said personal accounts represented around 92% of suspected mule account closures between 2023 and 2025, while around two-thirds of suspected mules were men among firms that recorded gender. The regulator cautioned that the data has limitations because not all firms collected the relevant information and some customers did not disclose it.
Andrew Bud, CEO and founder, iProov, commented: “The FCA’s figures show that UK firms closed nearly a quarter of a million suspected mule accounts last year, but mule accounts aren’t only those belonging to people who have been persuaded to sell control over their bank accounts. Criminals are also taking over genuine accounts, and using stolen or synthetic identities to open untraceable accounts in the first place. Traditional identity checks can struggle to detect this, particularly as increasingly sophisticated technology can be used to create synthetic faces and identities.”
“The latest strong liveness technology can help provide that additional layer of protection by verifying that the person behind the screen is a real, genuinely present human whose face has not been changed or created, and matches the identity they claim to be. Criminals may be able to steal credentials or take control of a device, but they cannot ever steal someone’s live face.”
The National Crime Agency estimates that more than £100bn is laundered through the UK or UK corporate structures each year, with money mule activity one method criminals use to move these funds. The FCA is working with industry and law enforcement on measures including improved intelligence-sharing to help identify linked accounts and disrupt mule activity earlier