Police are warning online shoppers to be on the lookout for scam artists who use prepaid phone cards and fake ads to get customers to send them money via MobilePay for goods that don’t exist.

East Jutland Police claims it has seen an increase in customers being ripped off via MobilePay, and that tracking those behind the fraud is hard to do due to the anonymity of the prepaid phone cards.

Frede Nissen, the head of local police in Vejle, said that despite warnings that they have played on the internet, young people are still falling for the scam in which people use MobilePay to pay for non-existent goods posted on the internet and the crooks disappear as soon as they have the money. Nissan said that this type of crime is on the rise throughout the country.

Bank won’t restrict use
Danske Bank, the company behind MobilePay, admitted that there are opportunities for fraud, but said that it is no worse than with other payment models.

The abuse level is very low,” said Bo Tolstrup Kristensen, the head of new concepts at MobilePay. “It is far less than the abuse we see with the Dankort.”

Kristensen said the decision to let anyone with a mobile phone use MobilePay – including those with prepaid cards – was a conscious one.

“It is important to us that the solution is easy to use,” he said. “We won’t prohibit the use of MobilePay because a few crooks are abusing our app.”