500 bank employees are fighting fraud
In five years, the number of employees making life hard for digital scammers has more than doubled. Finans Danmark's annual meeting focused on fraud.
Prompt task force
Finansforbundet’s presidency was among the participants, and Vice President Steen Lund Olsen noticed in particular how Finans Danmark is now launching a major information campaign in addition to setting up a fast-working task force to get one step ahead of the digital scammers.
"I’m hoping the task force will make a number of very clear recommendations, which it will be easy to put into practice. We need to make sure that it’s safe for the Danes to pay and send money, and that they can rely on the money ending up in the right place," says the Vice President, who also regularly receives emails trying to trick money out of him.
"Digital fraud is becoming increasingly sophisticated and complex. The wide cover proposed by Finans Danmark is crucial, and we’re very pleased to be participating in the work."
Privacy and fraud
As most Danes are experiencing this, it has caused a considerable degree of uncertainty in the population, resulting in almost every other person being worried about becoming a victim of sophisticated fraud.
A couple of the members of the task force, which is chaired by Christiane Vejlø, future analyst and digital trends expert, participated in a panel debate at the annual meeting.
One of them, Jakob Willer, CEO of Teleindustrien, pointed out that it is technically possible to achieve better protection against fraud.
"Telecom companies could potentially screen the content of messages and check for dangerous links. The question is whether that's a path we want to pursue. It's a slippery slope - but it's a discussion we should have. We won't win the battle, but it must be fought going forward."
The other member of the task force, Mikkel Hippe, put forward the idea of introducing different digital safety zones for the population:
"Senior citizens would enter a protected zone and could then let go of their concerns. Too many people are anxious about it. For instance my mother-in-law."
The task force must present its recommendations by the end of 2024.
Fraud explosion
While the number of online banking fraud cases was 3,897 in 2022, that number had grown to 5,212 cases in the first half of 2023 alone. This appears from statistics released by Finans Danmark.