A study conducted by electronic payments and banking provider ACI Worldwide, together with research and advisory company Aite Group, reveals that nearly 3 in 10 global consumers to not trust retailers for protecting stored personal and financial data against hacking attempts and data breaches. That is a 29% ratio, while 58% trust financial institutions rather than retailers, government agencies and law enforcement for data security.

Only 55% of respondents believe stores where they shop use security systems that protect their financial data against hackers and data breaches, as compared to 62% who believe that online shopping websites do provide security for this information.

The same source indicates that consumers seem to desire involvement in the payments security process. This is shown by 77% of respondents, who answered as being “very interested” to be kept up to speed and alerted via a phone call, email or text message, should any suspicious activity be registered on their cards or accounts. As a counter measure, 73% declared they prefer that their banks not to post transactions to their cards until they respond to fraud alerts.

However, in matters of consumer awareness, there is still a long way to go, as 4 in 10 global consumers (42%) do not remember receiving any anti-fraud information from their financial institution. Also, theft by a computer hacker is still believed to be the greatest fraud risk, according to 32% of respondents.

Per countries, prepaid card usage and the rate of fraud on such cards correlates. China and India present the highest rates of prepaid card fraud at 17% and 18%, respectively, and very high consumer use rates at 93% and 91%, respectively.

In countries with use rates of 70% or less, such as Australia, Canada, New Zealand and the US, fraud rates are 4% or less, indicating that the fraud rate may rise as more consumers use prepaid cards.
The study was conducted on more than 6,100 consumers across 20 countries.