CNP fraud up over past year

As Chip and PIN celebrates its first birthday, APACS figures reveale card not present fraud is on the up

Card-not-present (CNP) fraud is now the most common type of card fraud in the UK since the advent of chip and PIN almost a year ago, the Association of Payment Clearing Services (Apacs) has revealed to CRN.

According to Apacs, 138 million chip and PIN cards have now been issued and 900,000 shop tills have been upgraded to chip and PIN.

Mark Bowerman, a representative for Apacs, said: “The introduction of chip and PIN has helped us to tackle counterfeit card fraud, but now we are working hard to combat CNP fraud.”

Stephen Cox, principal security consultant at software giant CA, said: “The success of chip and PIN means the threat landscape has changed. Hackers are using more sophisticated ways to steal information. Chip and PIN has made it more difficult for criminals to obtain personal details at point of service, so the threat of data theft has shifted to the back-end systems.”

Apacs is working with banks, retailers and systems vendors on the implementation of a fraud prevention system to help tackle fraud in non face-to-face transactions.

“It works via a cardholder inserting their chip and PIN card into a hand-held card reader and entering their PIN,” Bowerman added. “On confirming the PIN, the reader generates a unique, one-time only passcode, which the cardholder provides when prompted, for authentication with the cardholder’s bank.”

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