A recent report issued by Europol, the European Union’s (EU) police agency, and covered by the EUobserver, details how citizens of the EU lose some €1.5 billion annually through criminals siphoning money through fraudulent use of debit and credit cards. The Europol report finds that “the majority of illegal face-to-face thefts most often occur in the United States.” The reason for this is that the “embedded security features on EU cards such as chips and pin technology are easily bypassed in the United States.” The report notes that criminals exploit the weaknesses in the United States because some US-based ATMs are not fully compliant with the Europay, Mastercard and Visa, or EMV® global standard for credit and debit cards based on chip technology.

According to the report “this phenomenon, and the lack of specific arrangements on reimbursement of losses caused by less protected terminals, the majority of the loss burden caused by this fraud is on the EU card issuers.” While the majority of illegal transactions occur in the United States, the problem is not confined to the United States. The report notes, “Organized gangs also steal money using the same techniques in the Dominican Republic, Colombia, Brazil, Russia, and Mexico.” The report concludes that “the ultimate solution to the problem would be to implement the EMV® standard on a global level, including making United States’ merchants compliant.” But, as the EUObserver articles points out, “costs to implement the standard on a global scale are exceptionally high and some banks still favor profits over what they deem as acceptable levels of fraud.”