Though the rate of suspected online financial services fraud attempts have still risen globally by 18.8% globally during April-June quarter over the same period a year ago, it declined in India by 15.35%, indicating stronger fraud control measures being adopted by the financial services industry, a release by the credit bureau said.
The rate of suspected digital fraud attempts on an aggregate rose 16.5% globally when comparing Q2 2021 to Q2 2020. But in India the percentage of digital fraud attempts decreased by 49.20% during the same time period.
The study notes that gaming and travel and leisure were the two most impacted industries globally for the suspected digital fraud attempt rate, rising 393.0% and 155.9% respectively in the last year. For transactions originating in India this rate rose 53.97% for gaming and 269.72%% for travel and leisure, the release said indicating a shift in industry[focus by fraudsters.
“It is quite common for fraudsters to shift their focus every few months from one industry to another,” said Shai Cohen, senior vice president of Global Fraud Solutions at TransUnion. “Fraudsters tend to seek out industries that may be seeing an immense growth in transactions. This quarter, as countries began to open up more from their COVID-19 lockdowns and travel and other leisure activities became more mainstream, fraudsters clearly made this industry a top target”.
The pandemic accelerated community – online dating and online retail transactions which require logistics and fraudsters have recognized this. “In India post the unlocks, travel and leisure has increasingly become a target as the industry recovers and fraudsters are looking to capitalize as more transactions return to this industry,” added Shai. “As fraudsters continue to target consumers, it’s incumbent on businesses to do all that they can to ensure their customers have an appropriate level of security to trust their transaction is safe all while having a friction-right experience to avoid shopping cart abandonment.”
