Online credit card testing by fraudsters can dramatically drive up payment gateway fees.  Historically, card not present financial fraud grows exponentially in countries after implementing EMV chip card processing, as thieves seek the weakest link for fake credit card purchases. Thieves use software to rapidly send cardholder data to payment web sites to verify if stolen cards are good, card testing, and since merchants pay a per transaction fee, regardless of approval, the financial impact can be devastating.

Companies with online pay pages are at increased risk. Since October 2015, online fraud attacks were up 11% 2015 Q4 Vs Q3, and up 215 percent from 2015 Q1. 83% of attacks involved botnets. Source: The Global Fraud Attack Index™, a PYMNTS/Forter collaboration. The preferred web pay pages have no login required, and provide detailed decline response reasons. I’m often asked by others in the industry to provide the latter, and for the same reason as for retail, it’s better than no one knows the reason for the decline. If you inform a criminal the expiration date is no good, they just need to figure out the right one.

PREVENTING ONLINE CARD TESTING

A layered approach is required to stop card testers since no single solution will stop fraudsters. Generally, the harder you make it, the more likely they will seek a path of less resistance.

• Block known fraudulent incoming IP addresses. The bad guys also use hostile proxy servers, with dynamically changing IP addresses every authorization attempt, but this is still a first step everyone should employ.

For additional assistance, please contact us. I won’t make it easier for criminals by identifying all the tools here in the blog!