Many merchants both within and outside of Europe are concerned with meeting Strong Consumer Authentication (SCA) requirements and how this might impact sales when nearly every eCommerce order over €30 will require two-factor authentication. A lesser known fact is that this order value threshold for requiring SCA increases in multiple tiers based on the fraud rates of both the acquiring and card issuing banks facilitating the transaction, suddenly making the fraud rates of a merchant’s European processors much more important.

Processing Through Acquirers with Lower Fraud Rates Reduces the Need for SCA Under PSD2

How to Secure Your Video Chats and Meetings to Protect Against “Zoombombing”
Keeping unwanted parties out of business meetings can range from important to imperative depending on the topics and focus of the video call. There has been a sudden increase in employees working from home and requiring the use of Zoom or other services. While many media reports have discussed the threat of “Zoombombing,” there are several measures video chat users can take to greatly reduce these occurrences and their impacts.
Here are steps anyone can take to reduce the likelihood of falling victim to e-meeting eavesdropping in Zoom.

Methods Fraudsters Use to Beat Two-Factor Authentication
While it is commonly accepted that passwords and the consumers who set them are inherently insecure, organizations put a lot of trust behind two-factor authentication (2FA) solutions. Here are several ways fraudsters have been able to beat this additional layer of security.

Will Enforcement of SCA in Europe be Pushed Back Again?
The UK’s Financial Conduct Authority (FCA) recently suggested that milestones related to ensuring Strong Consumer Authentication (SCA) compliance by March 31, 2021 may need to be postponed due to the COVID-19 pandemic. The European Banking Authority (EBA) has maintained their December 31, 2020 deadline but will continue to monitor the events and reassess.

Nearly Nine-in-Ten Organizations Experienced Spear Phishing Attacks While Over Half Fell Victim in 2019
According to a survey of over 600 IT security professionals across seven countries, 88 percent of organizations saw spear phishing attacks, 55 percent fell victim to at least one phishing attack, 86 percent experienced business email compromise attacks and nearly two-thirds experienced a ransomware attack.
The burgeoning issue and financial fallout from spear phishing is evidenced by the sheer number of organizations that experience and fall victim to such attacks. In their 6th annual State of the Phish report, cybersecurity firm ProofPoint surveyed IT security professionals across the US, UK, Germany, France, Spain, Japan and Australia. This survey along with surveys of over 3,500 adults across the same seven countries plus the results of over 50 million simulated phishing emails provided eye-opening results in this multifaceted study. Here’s a quick overview of some of these survey results highlighted in ProofPoint’s State of the Phish 2020 report:

Visa to Increase Interchange Fees for CNP Transactions this April
After leaving interchange rates mostly unchanged for the past decade, Visa sent a letter to partner banks outlining the coming changes to swipe fees that will roll out in two phases beginning in April then October this year. While high volume supermarkets as well as those with education and real estate merchant category codes (MCCs) will see a decline, eCommerce retailers will see base interchange rates increase from 1.90 to 1.99 percent on standard Visa rewards cards and from 2.5 to 2.6 percent on premium rewards cards for a $100 transaction.

Government Agencies in Puerto Rico Fall Prey to Pair of Spear Phishing Attacks Sending Over $4 Million to Fraudsters
After compromising the email account of a government official at one agency, targeted phishing attacks were sent from this trusted contact to other government agencies purporting that bank accounts for receiving their payments had changed. Puerto Rico’s Industrial Development Company sent over $2.6 million while the Tourism Company paid $1.5 million to fraudster-controlled accounts held on the US mainland.

LexisNexis Makes Two Major Risk & Identity Acquisitions in First Two Months of 2020
LexisNexis prepares to fund two acquisitions totaling $855 million as parent company RELX looks to buy two major names in the identity authentication and risk management space. This includes the acquisition of ID Analytics from NortonLifeLock in January followed by the purchase of email authentication vendor Emailage, announced in mid-February. Both deals are expected to close in the first quarter of this year.

Cyber Weekend Fraud Declines See 30% Increase Year-Over-Year and 50% Increase Relative to Rest of Year
The number of order attempts declined for suspected fraud increased by nearly 30 percent year-over-year for orders between Thanksgiving and Cyber Monday, according to data from iovation, that also found a fraud decline rate 50 percent higher than the yearly average (15 percent vs. 10 percent). Likewise, a cyber security firm found a 63 percent increase in malware while phishing attacks jumped 51 percent on Black Friday.

Online Order Returns Spike Post Holidays
Private courier UPS has declared January 2nd National Returns Day, the busiest package return day of the year, and prepared to handle nearly 2 million packages representing returned gifts on this day alone. We take a look at online order return rates and volume while discussing the costs, and even benefits, of reverse logistics operations for eCommerce merchants.