Fraud Costs US eCommerce $4 Billion In 2008, According To Industry Survey

An industry study, conducted by CyberSource Corporation, estimates $4 billion in losses to US online business, as a result of cybercrime. Read a summary of the report on their website here. Among the key findings of this year's survey include:

• Projected dollar losses to U.S. eCommerce will hit a record $4 billion in 2008 (up from $3.7 billion in 2007).


• Merchants expect to lose 1.4% of their online revenue to fraud--this rate has held constant for the last 3 years.


• This year merchants accepted a higher percentage of orders--working more aggressively to boost top line sales.


• Though eCommerce sales are still increasing, 87% of merchants say they must fight fraud with the same or less staff in 2009.


• Merchants showed a dramatically increased interest in more sophisticated automation tools.


• Contrary to popular view, eCommerce is hardly hands-off. For each of the past 6 years, approximately 1 out of 4 online orders have been manually reviewed.


• International orders continue to have over 3 times the fraud risk of orders from the U.S. and Canada.