Country's largest credit card issuer HDFC Bank has started replacing some points of sale machines at merchant establishments following card 'skimming' frauds, a top official has said. "We are replacing machines at some merchants," the bank's head for credit card and merchant acquiring, Parag Rao told reporters last evening.
Mr Rao said cases of 'skimming' have been witnessed in the country of late, wherein the card data is copied illegally in an otherwise legitimate transaction, only to be used fraudulently later. Mr Rao, however, did not share the number of machines being replaced or the number of skimming cases that have been detected.
HDFC Bank is one of the largest players in the merchant acquisition space as well, with close to 2.5 lakh machines. It has over 6.4 million cards in circulation with an outstanding portfolio of Rs 10,000 crore and 35 per cent market share.
Mr Rao said overall the instances of fraud reported in the country amounted to only a tenth of those observed in the developed world and that instances of fraud cases have no bearing on the delinquency levels observed in the bank's card portfolio.
HDFC Bank managing director Aditya Puri said such frauds are an industry-wide phenomenon and being a part of the ecosystem, the bank has also witnessed such instances and advised everyone to be extra careful.
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