A new report published by the BBC has indicated that online fraud in the UK could be much more widespread than first thought.
Earlier this year, official figures from the banking industry put the total losses relating to card-not-present fraud at around £290.5m in 2007.
However, the BBC report found if failed attempts had been successful, the total could have been £500m.
The BBC also revealed how easy it was to obtain stolen credit and debit card details on the internet.
Posing as computer hackers, two journalists infiltrated a website selling thousands of stolen card details which had been stolen online from small internet retailers.
When the cards were used, they traced the fraudulent transactions to a number of addresses in the UK and confronted people who signed for the goods they had bought.
The information is being passed to the police.
