O’Flynn victim of credit card fraud

A TD whose credit card was copied to defraud him of almost 2,000 wants banks to introduce security systems to make it harder for criminals to defraud credit card holders.

It is estimated credit card fraud costs Irish businesses up to €5 million each year.

One of the latest victims was Cork North Central TD Noel O’Flynn.

He believes his Bank of Ireland credit card details were copied two weeks ago in a restaurant while he was on holiday in Spain.

Criminals used the information from Deputy O’Flynn’s card a few days later to fraudulently obtain €1,960 worth of goods from a business in France.

They then made an unsuccessful attempt to use the bogus card at another location in France to obtain goods worth €2,400 last weekend.

The owner of the second business contacted the Bank of Ireland when he became suspicious. The bank established that Deputy O’Flynn was back home in Ireland and could not possibly be using his card in France, so the second attempted fraud was foiled.

“The fraudsters are way ahead of us,” said Deputy O’Flynn. “It has become a serious problem. The French have a system whereby all credit cards have microchips and pin numbers.” Under the microchip system a customer has to key in a PIN number before the card is accepted.

Deputy O’Flynn said the Bank of Ireland has reimbursed his money.

The Irish Payments Services Organisation is trying to encourage all credit cards issuers to employ the new technology.

However, it is unlikely the 2.5 million credit cards in circulation in Ireland will have microchip and pin number technology before 2005.

Bank of Ireland spokesman Eddie Ryan said half the credit cards in Britain had already been converted to the new system. But it will likely be a few years before shop keepers here will have upgraded their credit card facilities to accept the higher-tech cards.

Mr Ryan said the Bank of Ireland has its own tracking system to monitor anomalies in credit card spending.

“If a person makes a transaction in Cork and another in London an hour later, that could be feasible.

“However, it would be a different matter if they made one in Donegal and then an hour later in Cork,” Mr Ryan said.

He said credit card holders are not held liable for transactions they could not possibly have made.