Payment fraud surges 25% as criminals exploit shared infrastructure

Payment fraud has increased by around 25% according to recent analysis. Fraudio’s data reveals a rise in coordinated attacks across cards, merchants and payment systems. Fraudsters are increasingly exploiting shared infrastructure to carry out these schemes. More than 90% of observed fraud events were tied to shared infrastructure. This includes IPs linked to many cards, which served as the strongest fraud signals. Detecting repeated entities and connected activity has become critical for prevention.

Transactions routed through submerchants showed higher fraud rates than direct merchant transactions. This points to elevated risk in layered commerce models. Even when 3DS authentication succeeded, some transactions still exhibited fraudulent activity.

Fraudio’s false-positive proxy also rose, indicating that legitimate customers may be incorrectly flagged by broad fraud controls. The findings suggest that relying only on authentication methods like 3DS is not enough. The shift towards coordinated attacks highlights the need for layered fraud prevention. Shared infrastructure and submerchant transactions remain key risk areas. Businesses must refine their controls to balance security with customer experience.