What we know so far
South African bank customers, not the banks themselves, have become the primary target of financial criminals, fraud prevention firm BioCatch has warned.
Jonathan Frost, Director of Global Advisory at BioCatch, said in an interview with Moneyweb Radio that banking security has become so effective that criminals now have little choice but to trick account holders into moving money themselves.
“The security around bank accounts is generally so good now that the only way you can get the money out of the account is to effectively manipulate the customer into sending it on your behalf,” Frost said.
His warning builds on a BioCatch survey of fraud management, anti-money laundering and compliance leaders at South African banks, released on 13 May 2026. The survey found that 75% of respondents reported increasing fraud attempts at their institutions, 79% said fraud losses were rising, and 81% estimated their institution’s annual fraud losses at more than $5 million, about R82.3 million.
Among C-suite executives specifically, the figures were even higher. In that group, 81% reported increasing fraud attempts, 84% reported rising losses, and 86% put annual fraud losses above $5 million.
Frost cautioned that the pressure on customers is unlikely to ease soon. “It looks like it will probably worsen before it gets better. We’re now entering a new phase of an evolving threat environment,” he said.
Why it matters
The findings place South Africa at the top of a troubling global list. BioCatch surveyed banking leaders in 17 countries, and South African respondents reported rising fraud attempts, rising losses and losses above $5 million at higher rates than any other market.
BioCatch Director of Global Fraud Intelligence Thomas Peacock said the global averages were 61% for increasing fraud attempts, 60% for rising losses and 73% for losses exceeding $5 million. South Africa exceeded all three.
The shift in criminal tactics matters for every account holder because it changes who carries the risk. When a customer is manipulated into authorising a payment, the transaction is technically legitimate, which complicates reimbursement.
The BioCatch survey found that only 40% of South African respondents said their institution reimbursed more than half of scam victims. A further 45% said they reimbursed victims to maintain customer trust, while 38% reported balancing reimbursement against liability considerations.
Frost said in the BioCatch statement that social engineering has become the primary attack vector. “Fraudsters increasingly no longer break into banks. Instead, they manipulate customers’ cognitive and emotional states to override rational judgment,” he said.
The trend is confirmed by industry-wide data. The South African Banking Risk Information Centre’s Annual Crime Statistics 2024 recorded an 86% increase in digital banking crime incidents, rising from roughly 52,000 cases in 2023 to almost 98,000, with losses climbing 74% to R1.888 billion. Sabric attributed these incidents largely to social engineering techniques that exploit human error rather than technical compromises of banking platforms.
Key details and figures
The BioCatch survey, conducted among South African banking leaders and published in May 2026, produced several figures that quantify the scale of the problem.
On the threat itself, 75% of all respondents reported increasing fraud attempts, 79% reported increasing fraud losses, and 81% estimated annual institutional losses above $5 million. Reputational damage weighed heavily, with 78% ranking their concern over reputational risk as greater than or equal to their concern about the direct financial impact of fraud and scams.
Instant payments emerged as a particular worry. A large majority of respondents, 89%, said instant payment platforms such as Real-Time Clearing present a moderate to very high risk for fraud. Faster payments give victims and banks less time to detect and stop a fraudulent transfer before the money is gone.
On defences, 40% of those surveyed said their organisation was actively using some form of behavioural biometrics, a figure that exceeds the global average across the 17 countries surveyed. Frost argued that banks can no longer rely solely on passwords, one-time pins or trusted devices, telling Moneyweb Radio that the opportunity lies in how customers behave in the digital channel. “That’s the opportunity for banks to identify when customers are being manipulated,” he said.
Artificial intelligence is accelerating the threat. Frost said AI allows criminals to refine attacks rapidly, overcome language barriers and produce more convincing scams at scale. “It allows them to refine their attack very, very quickly and, as a consequence of that, people are more likely to unfortunately be deceived and fall victim,” he said.
Sabric’s 2024 statistics echoed this, flagging AI-generated phishing emails, WhatsApp messages and early cases of voice-based deepfake scams impersonating individuals and banking officials.
What happens next
Frost expects regulatory pressure to build over the coming decade. He told Moneyweb Radio that South African regulators are likely to consider stronger consumer protections, including requiring banks to reimburse more customers who are tricked into authorising fraudulent payments.
“I think it would be very strange if over the course of the next five to 10 years regulators in South Africa don’t begin to consider whether or not it would be appropriate for customers to achieve additional protection,” he said.
Greater liability, Frost argued, would push banks to invest further in systems capable of detecting manipulation before money leaves an account. No South African regulator has announced such a reimbursement requirement to date, and any change would depend on future policy decisions.
For now, the contest between banks and criminals is increasingly defined by who deploys AI more effectively. “The real question is who moves first and who moves fastest. Will it be the criminals or will it be those that are best placed to defend their customers and the potential victims,” Frost said.
Sabric has separately warned that real-time deepfake audio and video may become a common tool in fraud schemes, meaning customers should expect scam attempts to become harder to recognise, not easier.
