Credit card fraud

In the UK, the annual cost of credit card fraud was estimated to have risen from £50 million in 1989 to £165 million in 1993. In 1992, two million cards were list or stolen in the UK. In the USA in 1993, credit card fraud was expected to cost US$1.5 billion where an estimated 10,000 cards are stolen from 5,000 people every day. Other ways which criminals have used to obtain card information are filming users at teller machines and requiring people to swipe their credit cards in order to participate in a sales event. Fraudsters also make use of telephone, and now the Internet, offering services and asking for card numbers or ordering goods with someone else's name and number. A more recent form of credit card fraud is transaction laundering whereby fraudulent representatives inform businessmen that they need to have their card sales processed by another credit card merchant for tax or other reasons, promising to pay a fee for the service. These firms specialize in supply goods that are either sub-standard or non-existent, leaving the original merchant liable for the cost.