Faudsters continue to up the ante when it comes to the gambling industry. Credit card fraud increased by 155 percent over the past five years, reflecting an average annual growth of 39 percent, according to the Gambling Industry Report released by the TransUnion-owned antifraud technology provider iovation. The reports analyzes the trends that drove online gambling in 2018.
Though no one single factor led to the rise, the mobile devices gamblers use to play may be the key to curbing fraud. According to the report, 70 percent of online gambling transactions were made with a mobile device. This is why gambling merchants should focus anti-fraud efforts on mobile devices.
Part of the Problem
Though online gambling produces a ton of data – bets, deposits, searches, and withdrawals – every day, most merchants fail to take advantage of it. They, like many online businesses, think they have enough protections in place to prevent fraud. Unfortunately, most do not have nearly as much as they should. So what should online gambling merchants do with the data and what other steps can they take to protect their businesses from fraud?
- Work with Your Data: Use all of the optimized data that gets stored. Integrate graph database technology into your data-rich environment. With this technology, for example, you could create databases to identify suspicious accounts that used devices that were previously flagged by your system or accounts linked to past chargebacks. By choosing a half-dozen relevant data points and mapping them out, you could significantly cut down on fraud.
- Embrace Stronger Authentication: As previously mentioned, mobile is a hotbed for fraud. Some operators have found success using digital identity-based smart authentication to ward off fraudsters. The days of relying solely on static logins and passwords are over. Digital identity-based systems link anonymous, shared intelligence on users, their devices, behaviors, credentials, locations, and transactions to confirm their identities. Based on this information, systems are able to score the risk associated with the player, slimming down fraudulent transactions.
- Recognize and Plan: Finally, the simplest and most important thing that online gambling merchants must do is recognize that the industry has changed, will continue to change and fraud risks will evolve with them. To stay ahead, you can never take your eye off the ball. Smart merchants regularly will highlight risks and vulnerabilities at their businesses and come up with initiatives to combat them. Those stop being mindful of potential threats will get stung later.
The Final Say
As time goes on, expect the variety, scale, and scope of fraud attacks to continue to evolve in the gambling industry. With this in mind, merchants also will have to balance maintaining a positive online user experience with providing the highest levels of security. None of it will be easy, but it is necessary. The best efforts will include a combination of seamless customer authentication with cutting-edge fraud prevention tools that protect against current and future threats.
Apply Now
If you need an online gambling merchant account or credit card processing, contact high-risk merchant account provider, eMerchantBroker.com (EMB). It not only works with merchants of all backgrounds, chargeback histories, and processing histories, it offers fraud and chargeback mitigation tools. EMB takes fraud very seriously and encourages merchants to do the same. Apply online today using EMB’s simple, streamlined application. Eligible applicants get approved in as little as a couple of days.