Despite attempts of both retailers and financial institutions to combat the rise of online digital fraud, Filipino consumers continue to express concerns about being victimized during this popular shopping period-Christmas season.

'Just as the holiday season drives consumers online to begin shopping for gifts for their loved ones, so does it become a destination for fraudsters seeking to take advantage of this time for their financial gain,' said Yogesh Daware, chief commercial officer at TransUnion Philippines.

According to TransUnion's fourth quarter Consumer Pulse Study 93 percent of Filipino consumers are extremely, very, or moderately concerned with being victimized by online fraud this holiday season - a slight increase from 92 percent in 2022.

TransUnion came to its conclusions primarily based on intelligence from its identity and fraud product suite, TransUnion TruValidateS, which helps secure trust across channels and delivers efficient consumer experiences.

The rate or percentage of suspected digital fraud attempts reflect interactions that TransUnion customers either denied in real time due to fraudulent indicators or determined to be fraudulent after a manual review process-compared to all transactions it assessed for fraud.

'Online retailers must ensure that consumers shopping their sites for the best deals are at the same time protected from fraud in the most seamless and friction-right way possible.'

The study also revealed the suspected digital fraud rate for each day during the holiday shopping period in the Philippines. Similar to last year, the suspected digital fraud rate was the highest on Black Friday, November 24.

Based on proprietary insights from TransUnion's global device risk consortium, the analysis found that when the consumer was in the Philippines during the transaction within the Black Friday shopping period, 12.8 percent of e-commerce transactions were suspected to be fraudulent.

While this number was 4.4 percent higher than the same period in 2022, it was alarmingly 19.0 percent above the rest of 2023 before Nov. 23.

Despite the percentage of suspected e-commerce fraud in 2023 before the holiday shopping season being the lowest in the past three years at 10.7 percent, the rapid uptick during the Black Friday shopping period shows that retailers should remain cautious in detecting and combating fraud to protect themselves and consumers during the busiest business season of the year.

As part of this analysis, TransUnion also determined the top indicators of fraudulent e-commerce transactions during the holiday shopping season globally, including the Philippines.

This year, transactions per IP (triggered by an unusual volume of activity from a single Internet Protocol [IP] address to a customer's site in a short period) and transactions per device (triggered by an unusual volume of activity from a single device to a customer's site in a short period) were the leading indicators for potential fraud attempts.

'The days leading up to the Christmas holidays mark the biggest shopping season of the year for retailers in the Philippines, but equipping themselves with the proper tools to detect fraud at the first warning sign is a year-round priority. A critical way to minimize fraudulent transactions while at the same time protecting legitimate ones involves implementing holistic fraud solutions that can verify customer identity and authenticity at the very beginning of a transaction, includingboth account creation and login,' added Daware.

TransUnion is a global information and insights company with over 13,000 associates operating in more than 30 countries, including the Philippines.

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