Outseer, the global leader in payments authentication and monitoring solutions, has published its latest 1H 2022 Outseer™ Fraud & Payments Report,
showing the alarming power of social engineering and Authorized Push Payment (APP) fraud, with 75% of fraudulent online banking payments activity (based on $ value) originating from trusted accounts on trusted devices. This suggests that consumers are unwittingly parting ways with their money, having been duped by fraudsters’ scams.
 
The 1H 2022 Outseer™ Fraud & Payments Report features insights from the Outseer Global Data Network™ used by the Outseer Intelligent Platform™ while authenticating billions of consumer transactions.
 

“Social engineering remains a key weapon in the fraudster’s arsenal when it comes to fraudulent payments. We’ve all seen the news stories about APP fraud – such as romance scams and crypto fraud. But the fact that these attacks are getting more frequent, more sophisticated and make up three-quarters of fraudulent transactions should sound the alarm bells for banks,” says Mark Crichton, Head of Product at Outseer. “Technologies like AI and machine learning help recognize unusual patterns in payments and prevent fraud at the source. Without these cutting-edge technologies, APP fraud will continue to thrive, and more and more customers will lose out.”
Looking at the attack methods used by fraudsters, Outseer’s data showed that brand abuse – such as fake social media profiles and websites aimed at gathering personal data – continues to be the dominant attack vector. Brand abuse made up 65% of fraudulent attacks observed by Outseer during the first half of 2022. According to Crichton “Fraudsters are increasingly turning to brand impersonation attacks, underscoring the need for companies to monitor brand abuse constantly and to deploy rapid takedown services when it does occur.”
 

Other notable insights from the 1H 2022 Outseer Fraud & Payments Report include:
 
 • 70% of fraudulent transactions occur within the mobile channel
 • Growth of card not present (CNP) digital payments continues to rise bringing with it the increased risk of fraud. In the first half of 2022, Outseer 3-D Secure™ transactions grew 34%, during which time Outseer protected more than $110 billion in payments.
 • The majority of CNP fraud that was observed in the first half of this year was based upon account takeover.
 • Outseer observed a 277% global increase in the number of merchants using EMV® 3-D Secure in June 2022 vs. June 2021.
 • 87,000 attacks on customers were detected by the Outseer FraudAction™ team – this equates to an average of almost 20 attacks every hour.
 • The number of phishing attacks targeting the US grew 42% in the first half of 2022, while phishing attacks originating from Russia grew 25%.