EMV chip cards and readers were only introduced in the US in October of 2015. Yet, you already have chip cards in your wallet and use them daily. You also know, all too well, the growing pains associated with introducing this new POS technology. It has been plagued by slow processing and a slow learning curve on behalf of the users, both retailer and consumer. But, the EMV chip is doing the job it was meant to: it prevents magnetic stripe fraud that has plagued our credit card system. As a result, criminals have turned their attention elsewhere.
Finextra tells us more:
In late 2015 the US finally followed much of the rest of the world when Visa and other card schemes switched the liability for fraud-related losses to retailers that have not upgraded their hardware for EMV.
Experian notes that the increase in e-commerce fraud follows a similar trend pattern from countries that previously rolled out EMV cards – UK, France, Australia, and Canada – that also saw gradual increases in card-not-present fraud.
“We suspect that the EMV liability switch and increased adoption by merchants of chip-and-pin enabled terminals have had a profound impact on driving up e-commerce attacks,” says the firm.
Fraudsters that typically relied on committing counterfeit fraud have shifted their focus to the digital channels where they could have more success, and as more attackers enter a rapidly growing mobile and online commerce space it becomes increasingly difficult for merchants to spot them.
This means that businesses need to expect the increase in e-commerce fraud to continue over time and to be prepared to deal with it by employing a multi-layered approach that pairs transactional data elements with details about the user and their device.
Experian says that the biggest component of credit card fraud trends is the fact that 2016 was a record year for data breaches. There were 1,093 breaches, a 40% increase from 2015, according to the Identity Theft Resource Center.
Meanwhile, the Federal Trade Commission recently revealed a jump in consumers who reported that their stolen data was used for credit card fraud, from 16% in 2015 to more than 32% in 2016.
Most brick and mortar businesses, that are now protected by EMV chip readers, also operate in an e-commerce capacity. Now that they’ve gotten one “data security” door closed, another one opens. It is critical to have up-to-date Point-of-Sale systems as well as a secure network environment to act as a fortess around your data. Great Lakes Computer can help you for all of it, be it POS maintenance and repair or network monitoring. We can ensure your payment data has the best level of protection possible against all cyersecurity and criminal threats.
