• by Laurie Sullivan  @lauriesullivan, March 24, 2021

Fraudsters were more likely to go after Gen Z, 44%, and Millennials, 37%, more than any other age group globally. Those numbers increased in the U.S., 53% and 40%, respectively, according to recent data.

Since the COVID-19 pandemic began, fraudsters also have steadily increased their rate of digital schemes against businesses, TransUnion’s latest quarterly analysis of global online fraud trends found.

The study, which aggregates billions of transactions and more than 40,000 websites and apps, also found that more than one in three global consumers have been targeted by digital fraud related to COVID-19.

Findings suggest that the percent of suspected fraudulent digital transaction attempts against businesses worldwide rose 46%, compared with the time period between March 11, 2019 and March 10, 2020, as well as between March 11, 2020 and March 10, 2021. In the U.S., this percentage rose 22% in the same timeframe.

Shai Cohen, senior vice president of Global Fraud Solutions at TransUnion, believes the war against the COVID-19 virus not only accelerated digital adoption, but increased the war against digital fraud.

The telecommunications and financial services industries faced the biggest change in fraud rates, 57.52% vs 57.49%, respectively. Gambling at 54.81%, retail at 38.71%, insurance at 32.52%, and Travel & Leisure at 29.68% also experiencing increases.

TransUnion documented a 19% growth in transactions among its global Gaming customers from 2019 to 2020, and detailed the fraud impact in a special report. It determined that its online gambling customers experienced a 9% increase in the rate of suspected fraud when comparing 2019 to 2020 among the 576 million Gaming transactions TransUnion analyzed for risk indicators last year, according to the data.

The countries with the highest volume of fraudulent activity were the Seychelles, Kazakhstan, and Turkmenistan. Tempe, Arizona, Hamtramck, Michigan, and Colonial Park, Pennsylvania drew the most increases in the U.S.

TransUnion also documented a 21% increase in reported phishing attacks among consumers who were globally targeted with COVID-19-related digital fraud just from November 2020 to March 2021. It demonstrates how essential acquiring personal credentials are for carrying out any type of digital fraud.