Romance scams. Puppy scams. Peer-to-peer (P2P) fraud.
Like COVID-19 variants, the fraudsters and the scammers’ schemes continue to morph and mutate, shifting to fit the digital age.
We don’t always double-check to make sure that the person on the other end of the transaction is legitimate before we click the button to send payment, and then the bad actors disappear without a trace.
Chris Davey, vice president of product management at Early Warning, told PYMNTS in an interview that healthy friction and a bit of education can go a long way toward keeping the criminals at bay.
Making the Distinction
He noted that it’s important to make the distinction between scams and fraud — terms that are, quite often, conflated. Generally speaking, fraud happens when someone hacks into a consumer’s account in an effort to steal money or personal information. Scams differ a bit from fraud in that they seek to incentivize a consumer to willingly send money to someone who is promising a good or service in return for those funds.