Tips to Prevent Credit Card Fraud

Tips to Prevent Credit Card Fraud

Never write your card number on the outside of an envelope or postcard. When paying bills, only mail cheques within envelopes that aren’t see-through

Draw a line through the ‘blank lines’ on the charge slip: this will prevent frauds from adding to the total. Never write your PIN, carry it on in your wallet or purse, or provide this to an unknown party

Keep copies of your charge slips and returns and compare them to your statement when it arrives. Immediately call your card-issuer if an unrecognised charge or charges appear on one of your statements

Safeguard all your personal information and documents. Tear up or shred pre-approved credit card offerings before throwing them away

Keep a list of all your credit card numbers, and in case of theft, notify each card-issuer immediately

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TIPS FOR ONLINE USE OF CREDIT CARD

When using their card in the online world, consumers should only use ‘secure’ web pages — which can be identified by the locked padlock icon on the lower left hand corner of the browser. In addition, consumers should watch out for e-mails that could potentially be part of a phishing scam. They should look out for the following phrases in an e-mail:

‘Verify your account’: Businesses should not ask you to send passwords, login names, social security numbers, or other personal information through e-mail. ’If you don’t respond within 48 hours, your account will be closed’: These messages convey a sense of urgency, so that you’ll respond immediately. ’Dear Valued Customer’: Phishing email messages are usually sent out in bulk and often do not contain your first or last name.

Click the link below to gain access to your account’: HTML-formatted messages can contain links or forms that you can fill out just as you’d fill out a form on a web site. The links that you are urged to click may contain all or part of a real company’s name and are usually ‘masked’.

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MINIMISING POSSIBILITY OF CREDIT CARD FRAUD

Fraudulent activity on a card affects everybody — the card-holder, the merchant, the acquirer, as well as the issuer. While it’s not always possible to prevent a credit or charge card fraud from happening, there are a few steps consumers can take to make it difficult for a crook to capture their card numbers.

Today, several banks have policies in place that protect card-holders from losses attributed to credit card fraud. Banks are also implementing technologies for preventing fraud, and these are starting to make impact. However, these cannot make up for lack of consumer awareness.

Consumers should protect their credit cards just as they would cash. They should never let anyone else use their card, immediately sign the back of new credit cards and destroy old, expired cards.

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Tips to Prevent Credit Card Misuse

TYPES OF CREDIT CARD FRAUDS According to industry estimates, the credit card fraud rate in India is currently close to 25%. Credit card frauds can broadly be classified into three categories: traditional card-related frauds, merchant-related frauds and internet frauds.

Card-related frauds include an application fraud, whereby a person uses someone else’s personal information illegally, or provides false information about his or her financial status.

Some other examples of card-related frauds are creating fake or counterfeit cards by altering card details by re-embossing or re-coding them; or skimming — a process by which genuine data on a card’s magnetic strip is electronically copied on to another.

An example of merchant-related frauds is merchant collusion, where an employee acquires personal information and passes this information to fraudsters.

In the past few years, internet-related frauds have grown rapidly. In more developed markets, online frauds comprise almost 40% of total credit card frauds. In India, the numbers are low, but with credit card usage and access to the internet increasing, we need to be prepared for the risk. Online credit card frauds usually occur when a fraudster gets access to credit card details that are provided on an unsafe site.

Phishing is another online fraud technique that has emerged over the past few years. Phishing attacks occur when a consumer receives a request from a seemingly trustworthy source — for instance, an e-mail created to look like official communication from a reputed bank, asking the consumer to visit a particular site and submit his or her credit card details for official purposes. Unsuspecting consumers do so and are eventually duped of thousands of dollars this way.

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