When adjudicating between good and bad orders, fraud analysts are often coming to the table with false assumptions. Roxanna "Evan" Ramzipoor, content marketing manager, Sift Science, the machine learning online fraud prevention scientists, have just published her list of the ten fraud myths:

1. Myth: Fraudsters make small purchases to fly below the radar.

• Reality: Fraudsters make massive purchases.

2. Myth: Eastern Europe and Nigeria are the fraudiest places in the world

• Reality: The fraudiest country is…Mauritania

3. Myth: Republicans/Democrats are crooks!

• Reality: There’s no correlation between a state’s political affiliation and its population of fraudsters

4. Myth: After committing account takeover (ATO), fraudsters lie in wait for a while before using the stolen account

• Reality: Once fraudsters have stolen account credentials, they don’t wait around

5. Myth: Activity from ATO is just a blip on a user’s overall transaction history

• Reality: After an ATO, a fraudster’s activity represents up to 60% of the user’s annual spending

6. Myth: Fraudsters use stolen account credentials once or a few times after an ATO

• Reality: If a fraudster can get away with it, they’ll keep using stolen accounts until they’re caught

7. Myth: Fraud happens while you’re asleep

• Reality: Fraud happens all the time!

8. Myth: People commit fraud as a side hustle

• Reality: Fraud is a day job

9. Myth: The fraudiest day of the year is during the holiday season

• Reality: The fraudiest day of the year is…May 9

10. Myth: During the holidays, most fraud happens around Black Friday or Cyber Monday

• Reality: The fraudiest day of the holidays is…not Black Friday or Cyber Monday

Getting the full picture of how fraud happens

Sift Science believe that it is essential to understand how fraud happens by drawing on your company’s unique data to adapt in real time. Armed with this data, they claim that your “digital business can thrive, scale, and face future challenges head-on.”

(To learn more, download The Definitive Guide to Reporting on Fraud!)