Internet banking fraud alertness in the banking sector: South Africa

This paper analyzes internet banking fraud alertness to the general public by the South African banking institutions. The study is centered on routine activity theory, which is a criminology theory. A qualitative content analysis was used as the research technique for the interpretation of the text data from each bank's website through the systematic classification process of coding and identifying themes or patterns to provide an in-depth understanding of internet banking fraud alertness in the banking sector. A sample size of 13 out of 16 locally and foreign controlled retail banks in South Africa was used. The findings report that banks are not adequately providing internet fraud alertness information to the general public on their websites notwithstanding that most banks they do provide such information to log-in users and the use of that information is doubtful. This study suggests a need to augment internet banking fraud alertness information and passably inform internet banking users of the types of internet banking fraud perpetrated by internet fraudsters before they log-in for transacting. Considering the current and widespread quandary of internet banking fraud, the information of this paper is important for internet banking users to improve their aptitude in identifying fraudulent schemes and circumvent them, and for the banking institutions to invest more in the provision of internet banking fraud information to the general public.