Hotels and the travel business now top the list of fraud targets, according to research by FICO a provider of analytics and decision management technology. Overall, it found that counterfeit fraud fell by 60% between March 2009 and March 2011.

Analysis done on 55 million active credit cards represented in the FICO Falcon Fraud Consortium for Europe showed that card-not-present fraud accounted for 69% of all accounts victimised by fraud and 72% of all fraud losses. The top 10 merchant categories accounted for 30% of the total fraud losses, led by hotels/lodging, travel agencies and ATMs.

"Our analysis of the data shines a spotlight on the tremendous change that has occurred in Europe's fraud landscape," said Martin Warwick, FICO's fraud chief in Europe, the Middle East and Africa. "Chip and PIN technology has radically driven down counterfeit and other forms of ‘card present' fraud in the UK, which just three years ago accounted for some 60% of Europe's credit card fraud. In response, criminals are operating across borders, targeting countries such as Germany that have weaker detection and prevention capabilities, and shifting their attention to card-not-present schemes such as online fraud."

"It's worth noting that in the two-year period, only about 1% of cards we studied were affected by fraud," Warwick said.