GBP 236 mln lost through authorised push payment frauds

APP frauds take place where a victim is conned into authorising a transfer of money from their bank account into an account, which they believe is controlled by a legitimate payee, but is actually controlled by a fraudster.

The largest number of reported cases involved consumers, who accounted for 88% of reported cases and lost an average of GBP 2,784. Businesses lost on average GBP 24,355 per reported APP fraud case. Earlier UK Finance statistics on APP fraud for the first half of 2017 showed over GBP 100 millon being lost across 19,370 reported cases, with an average loss of GBP 3,027 for consumers and GBP 21,477 for businesses.

The report makes reference to the importance of funds recovery and acknowledges that the finance industry is responding to the ongoing threat of all frauds by working with government and law enforcement to better trace, freeze and return stolen funds’. Overall, UK banks and card companies successfully prevented GBP 2 in every GBP 3 of attempted fraud last year. UK Finance said GBP 1.46 billion of attempted fraud had been prevented.

Unauthorised fraud losses on payment cards fell 8% between 2016 and 2017 to GBP 566 million, although card spending increased by 7%. In total unauthorised fraud losses fell 5% to GBP 731.8 million, including unauthorised banking fraud, cheque fraud and payment card fraud. The fall came despite a 3% rise in the number of reported cases.