Online fraud declines but phishers are out in force

by Gill Montia

Story link: Online fraud declines but phishers are out in force

APACS, the body that represents UK payment service providers, has reported that the number of people making use of online banking has risen by 505% in seven years.

In 2000, just 3.5 million account holders were managing their money online, rising to 21 million by the end of last year.

Strong growth is expected to continue and APACS is reassuring online bankers that their chances of becoming a victim of fraud are low.

In 2007, losses from Internet fraud fell 33% year-on-year, to £22.6 million.

However, there has been a sharp rise in phishing, which involves fraudsters trying to trick people into revealing their bank account details, by sending spurious emails.

Phishing incidents rose 180%, to 20,600, in the first six months of this year, compared with around 7,200 in the same period of 2007.

According to APACS, consumers are well aware of phishing and usually find it easy to detect rogue emails but the association is warning people not to reply to such emails to let fraudsters know they have failed, as this could leave their PC at risk of a virus.

APACS director of communications, Sandra Quinn, is also reminding bank customers that they should only access their accounts online when using a PC with regularly updated anti-virus software and an activated firewall.