Criminals Target EU Cards Abroad

Thanks to EMV technology card fraud has been on the decline in the European Union since 2008. However, in a recent report, Europol has found that it still amounts to EUR1.5 billion a year.

The report has found that certain highly organized organized crime groups are committing card fraud in the EU by working around the EMV technology supposed to protect European consumers. Europol affirms that local European security measures are no longer enough and that a global approach is needed.

What is happening, Europol explains, is that criminals are targeting European cards outside the EU. For example when a European cardholder travels to a country where EMV is not enforced criminals target the card there, where skimming-related fraud is much easier to carry out. Actually, the report reveals, the majority of illegal face-to-face transactions affecting the European Union take place overseas, mainly in the United States.

As ‘card-not-present’ (CNP)[3] transactions do not benefit from the same security enhancements as Chip and PIN cards, CNP fraud is on an upward trend. In the period analysed, around 60% of losses to card fraud, totalling around 900 million euros, were caused by card-not-present fraud. Credit card information and bank account credentials are some of the most actively traded ‘goods’ on the Internet’s underground economy and this stolen data is used to create cloned cards which are used to make fraudulent card-not-present online purchases with EU suppliers.

Since the vast majority of such criminal activities take place online in multiple countries, often involving numerous parties, the most effective law enforcement solution is to task specialised cybercrime teams with such cases.

In the last year, Europol provided support to EU law enforcement authorities in hundreds of international investigations into payment card fraud. The new European Cybercrime Centre (EC3), which officially launches this week at Europol in The Hague, will be the focal point in the EU’s fight against cybercrime, contributing to faster reactions in the event of online crimes.