New data has shown the top three types of fraud currently affecting UK consumers. These include card not present fraud, purchase scams and stolen card fraud. Now, I’ll be speaking to Jim Winters, Nationwide’s Head of Economic Crime, to learn from him how shoppers can be extra vigilante in order to protect their finances this shopping season.
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NewsTranscript
00:00It's Black Friday, but actually Black Friday is more of a week or even two weeks.
00:07So we're being inundated by opportunities to save money and buy stuff much more, apparently
00:12more cheaply than you would at any other time of the year.
00:14So it's also a perfect time of the year for the scammers to kind of find more victims.
00:19So we're wanting customers to be vigilant.
00:22And when we're looking at our own data, it's interesting.
00:24We talk a lot about scams, particularly around Black Friday, but in terms of the numbers
00:29of individual cases, card not present fraud is still the most common type of fraud we
00:33get reported at Nationwide.
00:35So also asking people to make sure they check their bank statements and make sure they only
00:39use their cards at legitimate websites to keep themselves safe.
00:43Some top tips which have been issued to help avoid card not present fraud also includes
00:48to report anything suspicious to your building society or bank as soon as you can.
00:53Nationwide also recommends to use its scam checker service if you're in any doubt about
00:58who you're paying.
00:59So far, the scam checker alone has prevented £13 million in fraudulent cases to date.
01:06With card not present fraud, almost the more you use your card, the more likely for it
01:11to get compromised it is and therefore go on to be used by a fraudster.
01:15And I think what we have there is a very digitally active demographic.
01:20So card not present fraud was a fifth of all of the fraud we get reported at Nationwide.
01:25It was very, very closely followed by what we call a purchase scam.
01:29And that's where somebody would buy something often on an online marketplace.
01:35They'd pay for that item and then the item never appears.
01:38And purchase scams are incredibly common at the moment.
01:41As I said, they're about a fifth of all the cases that we have.
01:43They're not the most expensive frauds.
01:46They tend to be lower in value than some other types of scam.
01:49And at this time of year when we're all looking for a bargain, purchase scams are really,
01:53really common.
01:54So if you're thinking about buying something, try and use your credit card and try and make
01:57sure that you've actually seen that item before you buy it.