Bucharest, 26 June 2007-- The Southeast Europe Cooperative Initiative (SECI) Regional Center for Combating Transborder Crime, in cooperation with the General Inspectorate of the Romanian Police and the Microsoft Romania, is organizing on 26- 27 June in Bucharest the Meeting on the Cyber Crime and Credit Card Fraud.
During the two days Meeting, the SECI Member and Observer Countries law enforcement representatives as well as the private business experts will share views and discuss a number of important topics related to the Cyber Crime and Credit Cards Fraud.
In the last years South East Europe (SEE) has witnessed an increasing use of payment cards as the means for making financial payments worldwide. There are many places or sites where cards are used for financial transactions. Unfortunately, the increased use of electronic payments is accompanied also by illegitimate use of the electronic means. Criminal activity related to the unauthorized obtaining of data from payment cards, the manufacturing and usage of counterfeited cards is on the rise.
South East Europe has increasingly become the home region of criminal groups dealing with fraud schemes and the utilization of information technology for criminal purposes. These groups rapidly exploit the technological development and free movement opportunities, engaging their resources to transfer knowledge across borders and commit crimes in their home economic and financial environments and abroad.
Over the past four years, complex internet and plastic card frauds committed in the Western European countries were connected to the criminal groups in the SEE region. These crimes have spread to all SEE countries with the widening of Internet access and development of national payment card markets.