Surge in payment card fraud has been recorded since the beginning of the Russian invasion: what are the most common

Statistics show a significant increase in the number of fraudulent transactions after the beginning of the full-scale invasion of Russia, and the amount of losses due to the actions of fraudsters with payment cards has also increased - last year alone, they were 73% higher in annual terms. This was reported by the National Bank of Ukraine, UNN writes.

Details

Statistics from the National Police and the National Bank indicate that the number of fraudulent transactions has increased significantly since the full-scale invasion.

"According to the NBU, the amount of losses caused by fraudsters has increased significantly. Thus, the number of illegal actions with payment cards, which resulted in losses, increased by a quarter in 2023 and amounted to 272 thousand transactions, and the amount of losses of payment service providers, merchants, and customers from illegal actions with payment cards last year amounted to almost UAH 833 million. This is 73% more than in 2022," the NBU said.

Among the most common fraudulent schemes that caused losses to consumers were reportedly: deception with non-delivery of goods after prepayment on the Internet, phone calls on behalf of banks, phishing attacks, requests for financial assistance through social networks, and other similar schemes.

"Fraudsters work very quickly, new technological schemes are constantly emerging. Therefore, all our systems should work preventively, to prevent fraud, and we also need to strengthen cooperation with law enforcement agencies to exchange information to facilitate the investigation of such crimes," said Olga Lobaychuk, Head of the Financial Services Consumer Protection Department of the National Bank of Ukraine.

Recall

A criminal group misappropriated about UAH 11 million from the account of the Deposit Guarantee Fund, using malware to gain access to the account.