Thinking Money, a free financial advice and news site, counted up that credit card fraud losses total GBP609.9m, online banking fraud losses total GBP52.5m and cheque fraud total GBP41.9m. Credit card fraud is rising and, as the Association for Payment Clearing Services – APACS states, around 50% of this is now coming from card-not-present (CNP) fraud. Thinking Money believes that technological advancements by credit card companies will be fundamental in combating fraud. The EMUE card is the result of Visa’s teaming-up with UK credit card companies to trial a new technology which hopes to combat CNP fraud. The EMUE card has a small digit keyboard and an LCD screen embedded on the reverse of the credit card. When shopping or banking online you can type in your unique pin number. This will generate a series of numbers necessary to continue with your online purchases. Trials are currently tested by 500 Deloitte employees within the UK. It is hoped that Visa and MBNA credit cards will be able to draw conclusions by the end of the year on the effectiveness of this technology in reducing fraud and in understanding usability. Thinking Money hopes that this evolution of credit card protection should make online banking, online shopping and other instances of card-not-present shopping all the more secure. As a result, EMUE may well be part of the answer in saving retailers, consumers and credit card companies huge losses from fraud.