Visa tests out text fraud warnings

Published by Julia on Wednesday 20th August 2008, 08:10 | Filed under: SMS

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Visa has announced a new scheme to warn customers about potentially fraudulent transactions by SMS.

Using 2,000 guinea pigs, Visa is testing a new service which will send out text or email alerts to bank customers when certain transactions are carried out on their accounts, such as when a payment is made over a certain amount or a transaction is carried out abroad. Using SMS will cut the alert time down to hours rather than days. Customers will then be able to use the SMS to either verify the transaction is legit, or contact their bank about the fraud.

The scheme is just being trialled in America and Canada at the moment, but I suspect that it won’t be long til we see a similar offering in the UK.

Tags: fraud, SMS, text, visa

This entry was posted on Wednesday, August 20th, 2008 at 8:10 am and is filed under SMS. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.

TerenceEden

I'd say this should be as standard. Every time a transaction is made on my card, I should receive an SMS straight away.

"£12.34 @ Waterstones, W1. 0955am on 18/08/2008. Reply with FRAUD to place your card on hold."

Or, if you're busy, a digest at the end of every day.

Of course, this would be a lot easier if credit card companies had .mobi sites to let one check their balance.

Ricky Chotai

that is a fantastic idea, I agree this is what they should be implementing.

Ewan

We should have had this in 2003... why has it taken them X years to get off
their arse?

Ben Smith

Visa's the payment processor it's you bank that would need to implement this, at least in the UK. Not sure how / if it differs in the US.

sevendotzero

They've stolen my idea! I blogged this here on Mobile Industry Review a few weeks back.

Nir

I have had this service in Israel for about 6 months. Works great! I get an SMS within seconds of the transaction with all the details and a phone number to call if the transaction wasn't mine.

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