Even in the current economic climate, investments in fraud management are paying off as total estimated online revenues lost to fraud fell 18% in 2009, down to $3.3 billion from $4 billion in 2008, according to a survey from CyberSource.

The average rate of online revenue lost to payment fraud dropped to 1.2%, the lowest level recorded in the 11-year history of the survey.

Below, other findings from the CyberSource 11th Annual Online Fraud Report.

Merchants Accepting More Online Orders

The rate of accepted US and Canadian orders later determined to be fraudulent fell to 0.9% in 2009, down from 1.1% in 2008. Across industry sectors, consumer electronics reported the highest fraudulent order rate, averaging 1.5% for the year, but still down a half percentage point from 2.0% in 2008.

The percentage of orders rejected due to suspicion of fraud fell to 2.4% in 2009, from 4.2% in 2007––a 40% drop in order rejection over the two-year period and a 1.8% increase in total orders accepted.

Fighting Chargebacks

Merchants reported that chargebacks accounted for less than half (49%) of fraud losses in 2009. The remainder (51%) occurred when merchants issued credits to reverse charges in response to consumers' claims of fraudulent account use.

The share of fraud-coded chargebacks that merchants contested rose to an average 53% during the year, up 3 percentage points from the 50% reported in 2008, while medium and large merchants reported contesting chargebacks at slightly lower rates, 48% and 49%, respectively.

International Fraud Down Dramatically

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Online Fraud Down in 2009

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