According to VISA’s 2025 global study of payment fraud in e-commerce, several threats are intensifying. These include misuse of services and fraudulent product returns. Both types of fraud are on the increase. In fact, according to the Merchant Risk Council, 92% of merchants have been confronted with fraud linked to first-party misuse, and 72% with fraud involving product returns.
These fraudulent practices are particularly difficult to detect, as they occur in grey areas of the customer journey, and often escape conventional online payment controls.
First-party misuse
First-Party misuse refers to behaviors that appears legitimate, but are motivated by fraudulent intent. These include, for example, taking out a loan with no intention of repayment, providing false information in the customer journey. Or creating multiple accounts (often using pseudonyms) to take advantage of promotions.
This form of e-commerce fraud is linked to an increase in the skills of fraudsters, who are learning to circumvent platform rules and manipulate commercial interfaces. The VISA 2025 study refers to the worrying rise of illegal Fraud-As-A-Service services. These sites are easily accessible online, and assist users with fraudulent procedures.
Why is this fraud problematic?
- Costly : according to the Mercator Advisory Group, the global cost of service abuse fraud is estimated at $50 billion.
- Difficult to detect: fraudsters pass KYC checks and appear as legitimate customers. Traditional detection systems are often ineffective at this stage of the customer journey.
- Complex to arbitrate: in the event of a dispute, users often cite an error or misunderstanding. Chargeback is sometimes used to recover funds, without alerting the merchant, which complicates problem resolution.
Fraudulent product returns
Product return fraud is one of the fastest-growing forms of e-commerce fraud over the past 12 months. Unlike payment fraud, which aims to avoid paying for a product, return fraud aims to keep or use the item while obtaining a refund.
According to the VISA 2025 study, several abusive return practices are common today, including :
- The buyer claims that the goods were never delivered.
- The customer returns a used or damaged product after use – a practice known as wardrobing (buy, wear once, then return).
- The buyer performs a switch fraud, ordering a new item to replace a defective or used one he already owns.
These fraudulent techniques have a direct impact on the profitability of online retailers, especially as managing returns requires costly logistics. By 2024, fraudulent returns would account for up to 14% of all returns on some platforms, according to the Wall Street Journal.
Proactive detection of e-commerce fraud: monitor the entire customer journey
To effectively combat advanced fraud in e-commerce, retailers must therefore adopt a global monitoring of the customer journey, just beyond the checkout and payment stages. Enhanced monitoring must cover all phases of the customer experience:
- Brand and product search
- Brand and product evaluation and selection
- Purchase / check-out
- Payment
- Delivery
- Product return / refund request
By analyzing the user path, we can identify suspicious behavior, such as sudden changes to personal information before a return, or a high frequency of complaints. These fraud patterns are therefore valuable warning signals for detecting misuse or fraudulent returns.
According to the VISA study, nearly 66% of online merchants plan to invest more in fraud detection tools, 20% of them significantly.
The Heptalytics solution sets itself apart by analyzing all user behavioral data. It enables upstream anticipation of the risks of return fraud orservice abuse, even before the purchase phase.
