As the Crime and Policing Bill moves through the final stages of its legislative journey, the time remaining for UK businesses to prepare for a significant shift in how UK enforcement powers are exercised is closing. Paul Chadwick looks at what the Bill could mean in practice for tech firms and the wider business community.
For global technology firms such as Apple and Google, and other giants likely to be classed as having ‘strategic market status’ by the CMA under the Digital Markets, Competition and Consumers Act, the message is clear: expect accelerated requests, deeper technical scrutiny and stronger expectations around cooperation.
For businesses more broadly, the direction of travel is similar, but the pressure points differ. In‑house legal and compliance teams should expect UK agencies to move faster, lean harder on their existing and evolving authority and test corporate systems, controls and data‑governance frameworks more assertively.
What the Bill means for tech firms
The Bill is expected to enhance the practical investigatory reach of UK authorities by streamlining processes, accelerating timelines and strengthening the use of existing powers to compel information, including in cross-border matters. For large tech firms, this translates into:
- an increase in the frequency and urgency of data requests, reflecting faster investigative timelines
- closer examination of internal systems, data-handling design, retention practices and the practical implications of encryption for lawful access
- higher expectations around responsiveness and technical clarity
- a willingness by UK authorities to challenge global platforms, in line with trends in the EU, US and Australia
What the Bill means for businesses beyond big tech
The Bill affects any organisation that holds significant customer data, operates complex supply chains or faces fraud and economic crime exposure in the UK. That includes financial services, retail and e‑commerce, telecoms, cloud providers, logistics, manufacturing and professional services.
These firms should expect:
- quicker moving investigations
- expedited information demands
- more scrutiny of how data, systems and controls are managed across UK operations
In‑house teams should review incident response plans, law enforcement engagement protocols and data access governance before expectations toughen.
What agencies may now require
Under the Bill, agencies would be able to push harder for cooperation. In practice, that is likely to mean:
- more rapid disclosure of user or customer data in response to lawful requests
- requests for expedited production of data from systems, including cloud-hosted environments, and for technical cooperation to enable lawful access
- technical assistance obligations, including requirements to provide data in an intelligible form where this is lawful, proportionate and technically feasible
- on‑site enforcement activity, including dawn raids
- greater coordination between enforcement and border authorities in support of existing powers to seize or examine devices and data carriers
The real test for multinational firms will likely be whether their governance and escalation structures can handle urgent, cross‑border demands.
Lessons from recent cases
Recent enforcement actions provide insight into the regulatory posture UK authorities are increasingly adopting.
- Apple: CMA investigations demonstrate regulators’ willingness to demand detailed technical information and, where statutory thresholds are met, impose behavioural remedies on firms with strategic market status.
- Amazon: UK and EU probes demonstrate regulators’ willingness to seek extensive internal data and transparency over algorithms.
- Meta: Disputes over encrypted messaging highlights the growing tension between technologies which preserve privacy and investigatory needs, a dynamic likely to persist as enforcement expectations increase.
The common theme is that authorities expect fast, full cooperation, and regulators are increasingly coordinated across jurisdictions.
The Investigatory Powers (Amendment) Act 2024 and enforcement vs encryption
Recent and proposed amendments to the Investigatory Powers Act (IPA) intensify scrutiny of how encryption affects the ability of authorities to obtain data lawfully. While the government denies seeking ‘backdoors’, the revised framework expands the ability to require companies to provide data in an intelligible form when lawfully requested.
For businesses reliant on strong encryption, this raises operational and reputational risks. The Crime and Policing Bill sits alongside the IPA within a broader enforcement landscape, in which system design and data flow decisions increasingly attract regulatory attention.
Managing enforcement risk – dawn raids, borders and remote access
In practice, tech companies, and increasingly any business with significant data exposure, should assume that a wider range of intrusive tools may be used, sometimes at speed. That includes:
- dawn raids on UK offices with the seizure and imaging of devices and servers
- border interventions
- orders and requests requiring organisations to facilitate lawful access to data held across globally distributed systems.
- unannounced engagement with employees (including interviews) and immediate information requests, subject to applicable legal safeguards, bringing with them difficult questions around internal communications and media risk.
The firms that fare best in these situations are those that have rehearsed them and have clear, well‑understood escalation pathways long before an investigator appears in reception.
Practical steps for tech firms
To move from awareness to readiness, firms should:
- map data flows and storage locations so they can retrieve relevant UK data quickly
- review encryption positions and processes for handling technical capability notices
- train staff on dawn‑raid and investigatory‑engagement protocols and issue simple guidance for front‑of‑house, IT and senior management
- establish a cross‑border response team spanning legal, compliance, security and IT engineering
- plan how to preserve legal professional privilege during searches, interviews and seizures
- engage constructively with regulators to build credibility and reduce friction when issues arise
If your organisation needs support on enforcement preparedness, investigatory response or understanding how the Crime and Policing Bill and related regimes may affect your business, our Business Crime & Investigations team can help you assess risk, design practical response plans and train your teams.
How can we help?
For further information about issues raised in this article, please contact a member of our Commercial Disputes team.
