Ethan Magnet
Fraud in online trade – challenges for shop operators
Online retailers continue to benefit from the upward trend in e-commerce. The ongoing digital transformation of commerce plays an important role and offers many opportunities retailers can benefit from. Regardless of whether they have their own shop system or trading platform – online traders have a broad set of tools at their disposal to sell their products online.
In view of these diverse possibilities, it would be reasonable to assume that shop operators can bring their goods to market safely and without major hurdles. However, retailers still face the challenge of protecting themselves against frauds. Even though the technical possibilities for online shop owners have grown steadily, the commitment and know-how of those who are up to no good is also growing. It is therefore not surprising that a large proportion of online merchants have already been confronted with fraud or attempted fraud (ibi research, 2015, p. 13). There is therefore no question that online shops can regularly become the target of frauds who try to get hold of the merchant’s goods by various means. On the part of shop operators, this has primarily financial consequences, as they not only suffer damage due to non-payment, but also have to invest in security measures. If one asks online retailers what challenges they have to deal with in concrete terms, the picture becomes increasingly clear. A distinction can be made between several forms of fraud.