UrBC, Moscow, February 20, 2019. RUB 1.38 billion worth of unauthorized plastic card transactions took place on the Russian market in 2018, Russia’s Central Bank’s report on last year’s unauthorized transfers indicates.

It is reported that the unauthorized transactions involving cards issued within Russia amounted to RUB 1.384 billion in 2018, up 44% on the year 2017, when the figure was RUB 961.3 million.

The number of such transitions also went up by 31.4% and came to 416,900. This amounted to 0.0018% of all the credit/debit card transactions last year (compared with 0.0016% in 2017). This percentage still remains below the target limit.

Also, the overall number of transactions involving credit and debit cards issued by Russian banks rose by 34.6% last year, reaching 32 billion.

In 2018, 46% of plastic card fraud cases occurred when offenders obtained access to a cardholder’s e-banking data using phishing software. About 39% of cases involved some social engineering techniques or failure to comply with the software operation rules; 15% of cases had to do with other issues.