Protection Service As an online vendor, your exposure to credit card fraud depends to a large extent on what you're selling. Intangibles are the easiest target. Top of the list by far are adult sex sites. Although there are no published figures, anecdotal evidence suggests companies handling sex site signups often set swipe commission rates as high as 50 per cent, using the income generated to hide chargebacks. Software sales, pay per view sites, gambling sites, informational sites and so on are equally at risk. Indeed, many will no longer take orders from free email account holders or overseas customers. Microsoft's Expedia set aside $6 million for credit card fraud in 1999 but most online retailers refuse to divulge fraud figures for fear of losing customer confidence. Large ticket item sales are just as risky. For example, many online retailers now refuse to accept orders with different billing and delivery addresses. Even this doesn't help if someone is prepared to set up fake credit card accounts using empty house addresses - and there are criminal organisations exploiting the weaknesses of the credit card system in this and other ways. It's a problem which can only get worse without a change to a more secure online payment system which both proves the identity of both parties and cannot be repudiated. Both sellers and buyers must have confidence in online sales. If online sales don't become more secure vendors will either insist on payment up front or become uneconomic as their increased sales costs penalise their customers for buying online.