Card fraud rises 43% in a year
A total of 13.5 mln euros went from cardholders to swindlers in 2023, BoG data have shown
Greece lost 13.5 million euros in 2023, falling victim to fraud by people who either stole their card or their data. This is a part of the total loss that occurred through plastic money fraud, the amount of which increased from €16.2 million to €23.8 million (an increase of 46.9%), as the remaining €10.3 million was charged to banks and payment providers.
Incidents of fraud increased by 43% from 2022 to 2023, from 287,300 to 410,300, and one of the main reasons is the rise in online transactions which increases the appetite of the scammers to intercept card details or embezzle larger amounts.
Common types of payment card fraud are: transactions with a lost or stolen card, or with a card that was embezzled before reaching the beneficiary's hands; issuing a card using false personal or financial information; forgery – i.e. creation of a clone card that can carry out transactions in businesses, while the real card is in the hands of its owner; and interception and illegal use of the card number in remote transactions or on the internet.
As can be seen from the data included in the Financial Stability Report of the Bank of Greece, the number of incidents of fraud as a percentage of the total number of transactions increased by a quarter compared to 2022, despite the fact that it is still kept at a low level of 0.02%. That corresponds to one fraudulent transaction per 5,400 transactions.
As a percentage of the total transaction value, it remains at a low level, 0.02%, corresponding to €1 of fraud value per €4,300 of transaction value, but this percentage is shown to have increased by a third compared to 2022. Fraud incidents increased by almost three times the rate of increase in the number of card transactions in the previous year (which was 15%), to €2.2 billion from €1.9 billion in 2022.
Most frauds are found in e-commerce – that is, where the transaction takes place without the use of a physical card – however, fraud incidents detected at ATMs or POS were also high in 2023.