And now for something completely different – losses due to card fraud at EU payment terminals have fallen to the lowest level since 2005.

Figures released by the European Association for Secure Transactions (East) show total losses of €107 million for the first six months of 2018 – a 43% drop – primarily as a result of a 19% dip in card skimming scams (down from €118 million to €104 million).

East executive director Lachlan Gunn says: “The significant drop in card skimming incidents and losses reflects the continued effectiveness of EMV, as well as the work that has been put in by payment terminal deployers and card issuers with regard to counter-measures such as geo-blocking, fraud monitoring capabilities and fraud detection.”

Logical attacks against ATMs were also down 46%, while cash machine jackpotting attempts pulled in a miserly €0.25 million, compared to €1.51 million in the equivalent period last year.

Instead, criminals appear to be resorting to brute force tactics, with ram raids and explosive attacks all ticking up. Losses due to ATM related physical attacks were €15.1 million, a 24% increase from the €12.2 million reported during the same period in 2017.

– Finextra –

Visa has announced they will be updating their rules and will be allowing DCC (Dynamic Currency Conversion) on Visa International Transactions effective 13th April, 2019.

Mastercard already allows DCC on Mastercard Transactions and so this will be an additional income stream for ATM Operators.

Criminals stole more than £500 million from UK bank account holders in the first half of 2018, according to industry figures.

Bank trade group UK Finance says that £145 million of the losses were down to authorised push payment (APP) scams, where crooks trick victims into sending money to another account.

The remaining £358 million was lost in unauthorised fraud, where fraudulent transactions are made without the bank account holder’s knowledge. UK Finance says that despite the losses, the industry managed to prevent over £700 million in unauthorised fraud.

Customers who experience unauthorised fraud are usually refunded by their banks. However, APP victims generally do not.

Mobile banking concept

In June the Financial Conduct Authority proposed updating its complaint handling rules to help victims of APP scams after an initial review of the way banks handle them found procedures were inconsistent, that their existing fraud detection systems could not easily detect APP fraud, and they didn’t collect enough data.

Katy Worobec, MD, economic crime, UK Finance, says: “The finance industry is committed to fighting back, investing millions in security systems and cyber defences to protect customers.

“We have brought in new standards to ensure scam victims get the help they need from their payments provider; we are supporting law enforcement in disrupting the criminals and freezing stolen money; and we are assisting the government in improving intelligence sharing to extinguish the threat.”

– Source: finextra.com –

The UK’s love affair with contactless payments continues to flourish, with almost one in two transactions now tap and pay, according to Mastercard figures.

There has been a 95% increase in contactless transaction in the year to date, with the technology now representing 46% of all transactions every month, says Mastercard.

This puts the UK at the forefront of the tap and pay revolution, with Transport for London cited as a major driving force for adoption.

Now more than a decade old, the technology is also shedding its reputation as as security problem. Long gone are the days when wary users covered their wallets in tin foil, with most people now believing contactless is at least as safe as traditional payment methods.

In fact, a recent survey from GoCompare found that nearly half of Brits now want the contactless limit increased from £30 to at least £50.

“The UK is a global leader in its use of contactless. The technology has fast become synonymous with our everyday payments. It is faster and easier to use than cash and yet it affords more security. As such the adoption and trust in contactless can only increase from here,” says Mark Barnett, president, Mastercard in the UK.

– Finextra –

Cards now account for more than three quarters of the value of retail purchases in the UK, as contactless payments continue to eat into cash’s share of the pie.

According to the latest British Retail Consortium’s (BRC) annual payments survey, cards were used to pay for £277.1 billion worth of goods in 2017, accounting for 76% of retail sales volume.

Meanwhile, cash continued its decline both as a share of retail transactions (down 0.5%) and value of sales (down 1.2%), where it now make up just 22%.

The BRC says that the rise of card payments is hitting its members in the pocket, with retailers spending an extra £170 million to process payments in 2017. Fees are now approaching £1 billion a year.

The group is blaming the rise entirely on the card schemes, claiming that fees have jumped by 39% in 2017, and is calling on the government and regulator to step in.

– Finextra –