Security and fraud prevention

Our first priority is the security of our customers' money. Research shows that consumers are concerned about fraud, so we are constantly working to improve the security of our services.

Throughout 2007, we helped the UK government and police by continuing to detect and report fraud.

Our anti-fraud work operates on a number of fronts, including transaction profiling to help detect and reduce fraud. This prevents many acts of fraud being completed, protecting customers from the inconvenience of sorting out such issues. Our customers are also protected by a fraud guarantee – if they are innocent victims of fraud who have not been negligent they receive a full, and often immediate, refund of any lost money.

In 2007, we launched PINsentry — a new level of security for online banking that uses chip and PIN technology. By the start of 2008, more than one million customers had PINsentry devices. These are small card readers that work with a customer's chip and PIN card to generate a unique passcode for each online banking session. As a result of this and other initiatives, we've cut online fraud losses by 91%, compared with an industry-wide reduction of 33% reported by APACS, the UK payments association.