Spanish banks using BioCatch have reported a 23% reduction in overall fraud attempts in Q1 2025 compared to the same period last year, according to the RegTech company.
The decline stands out against a backdrop where 73% of Spanish banking leaders surveyed by BioCatch noted an increase in fraud attempts at their institutions over the same period.
A significant driver of the reduction among BioCatch’s Spanish banking partners has been a 52% drop in third-party account takeover fraud. However, social engineering scams continue to challenge the sector, with case volumes holding steady and now making up 58% of all reported fraud cases in the country.
BioCatch director of global fraud intelligence Thomas Peacock said, “As third-party fraud has grown more difficult to execute in Spain, bad actors have pivoted, mastering the art of socially engineering their victims to willingly authorize and execute fraudulent payments on the criminals’ behalf. In 2025, this is undoubtedly the No. 1 problem facing banks in Spain.”
The insights come from the “2025 Digital Banking Fraud Trends in Spain” report, which also signals where fraudsters may turn next as defences improve. Card fraud and malware-related attacks are rising in the country, with malware in particular posing a growing risk to Spain’s mobile banking ecosystem. Nearly three quarters of mobile banking sessions in Spain now originate from Android devices, making them a key target for malware-based attacks.
Peacock said, “This reinforces the need for a proactive malware detection strategy rather than reactive approaches.
“Isolating the behaviours seen across multiple malware strains can help banks get ahead of the problem and reduce their dependence on the quick identification of individual malicious packages. With behavioral solutions, banks can identify malware sessions even when fraudsters modify or the bank has never before seen the malware’s packaging.”
The report also highlighted the increasing role of mobile platforms in fraud attempts. Mobile devices were used in 80% of fraudulent sessions in the past year, up from 72%, reflecting fraudsters’ ongoing shift to target consumers through mobile banking channels.
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