Global fraud is on the rise, with the US leading in fraud attempts, Veriff finds

The 2020 Fraud Report by Veriff  has revealed the US experienced more fraud attempts than anywhere else in the world, with increased fraud attempts as a result of the COVID-19 pandemic in the fintech, mobility and crypto sectors.

Veriff analysed millions of verification data points from its global customer base across 190 countries to determine common types of fraud by region and industry. As fraud rates increased this year, this data underscores that traditional methods of identity verification, such as social security numbers, have created a false sense of comfort.

Key findings include:

• the US has the highest fraud rate in the world nearing 10%, followed by Vietnam (9%) and Nigeria (6%);
• due to increased online activities as a result of the pandemic, there was a > 3x increase in overall fraud rates in the fintech and mobility sectors this year; 
• the mobility industry saw a 16% jump in fraud rates from H1 2020 to H2; similarly, the fintech industry experienced a 7% increase and cryptocurrency saw an 11% jump;
• identity fraud is the second most prevalent type of fraud in crypto (40%) and the most common type in fintech (70%); after comparing H1 2020 to H2, Veriff saw an 11% increase in identity fraud rates.

Veriff’s fraud team analyzed data across millions of verifications in 2020 from 190 countries all over the globe. The company supports close to 9,000 different government-issued IDs when verifying people. The 2020 Veriff Fraud Report includes insights tracked from verifications between January 1, 2020, and December 7, 2020.