NASHUA, N.H. (AP) – New Hampshire is stepping up its fight against computer criminals.

Speaking at a conference on white-collar crime, Attorney General Kelly Ayotte said her office is considering a proposal to create a “master computer brain” to help investigate computer crime. The machine would help investigators decode information on computers seized as evidence, she said

Ayotte said the state also is working with the University of New Hampshire on a survey to identify computer-crime experts around the state and to determine how to best to use them.

New Hampshire had the seventh-highest percentage of fraud complaints in the country last year, according to Thomas Colantuano, U.S. Attorney for the District of New Hampshire.

The U.S. reported 10 million identity-theft victims last year, he said. The result, he said, was a $50 billion loss for businesses and a $5 billion loss for individual victims.

“It’s a big problem, and it’s growing,” Colantuano said.

This fall, the state successfully prosecuted a former John Hancock representative, Koji Goto, on charges that he swindled $3.2 million from clients who thought they were buying securities. Goto, 34, of Bedford, was convicted on 23 criminal charges in September. More recently, authorities charged another Bedford man, Phillip Scott Scherrer, 55, with bilking about $3.3 million from 45 friends and neighbors.

“We need to keep up with the pace of the criminals on this issue,” Ayotte said. “Let’s face it: The criminals are using computers to bilk our citizens of millions of dollars. They’re using computers, unfortunately, to be predators with our children. And so, we need to get ahead in terms of law enforcement on this issue.”