Even with the projection of great success, with 85% of people planning to buy something, according to Mercado Livre data, Black Friday always raises a warning signal for retailers. This is because, in the last year, a Clearsale survey indicated that during this period, there were more than 400 fraud attempts per hour, which would amount to a loss of R$ 8,500 per minute. Furthermore, a survey by Serasa Experian estimates that in 2024 there will be 89,000 scam attempts between Friday and the weekend of that date, corresponding to approximately R$ 500 million in losses.
Although most scams target end consumers, in most cases, the retailer is the one who ends up being harmed. This is because, in the event of data theft on your platform, you are obliged to compensate your affected consumer, as it is your responsibility to ensure a secure environment so that your user can make purchases peacefully. Additionally, one of the most common forms of fraud in e-commerce involves criminals purchasing products, receiving them normally, and then claiming that the store did not ship them, thereby obtaining a refund. Thus, the merchant is left without the money from the sale and without the merchandise, which is resold by the scammer.
By maintaining a secure environment for your users, the e-commerce platform preserves its online reputation, which is essential to ensure customer loyalty, as data from Opinion Box shows that 73% of users tend to thoroughly research the reputation of online stores before making a purchase. Furthermore, the E-Commerce Trends 2024 survey is conclusive: 92% of people have already stopped shopping online due to fear of fraud. Another data point from EY shows that 71% of Brazilian consumers are afraid of having their data stolen online.
In this way, how can the retailer protect themselves from the most common scams and ensure success on Black Friday? An effective solution has been the use of anti-fraud tools that enhance their systems with AI and Machine Learning. This type of technology is capable of evaluating various transactional data from clients, identifying consumption patterns, and thus building a database of information. In this way, she has in hand all the online behavior of a specific consumer, such as the most used payment method, the most searched products, the most accessed location, the favorite days for making purchases, etc.
Thus, if any transaction deviates from the matrix established by the technology, the system understands that it could be fraud and alerts the retailer. The most interesting thing is that the Machine Learning solution can improve itself, because the more transactions it evaluates, the more information it adds to its database, which only increases its accuracy in detecting fraudulent operations. With this, technology is always up-to-date even with the most current models of virtual scams.
To give an idea, a survey by Accenture showed that companies that adopted AI and machine learning technologies in fraud prevention saw a reduction of up to 70% in financial losses caused by scams. Therefore, investing in this type of solution is essential to protect your operations and ensure a secure shopping environment for consumers. In addition to minimizing financial losses, this strengthens your reputation during a high-demand period like Black Friday, contributing to the success and longevity of the brand in e-commerce.
