Neldi Rautenbach

In short UK banks must now reimburse APP scam victims for eligible Faster Payments and CHAPS claims up to £85,000, split 50/50 between sending and receiving providers, within five business days, since October 2024. Weak fraud controls are now a conduct issue. Under the FCA Consumer Duty, a customer scammed because of inadequate systems is treated as foreseeable harm — not just an operational loss. DORA makes fraud defence a board responsibility.

On 7 July 2026, Claudia Buch, Chair of the ECB's Supervisory Board, wrote to the chief executive of every significant institution under European banking supervision. Letter SSM-2026-0301 gives each bank until 31 October to hand its Joint Supervisory Team an action plan on AI-enabled cybersecurity threats. The same day, the European Systemic Risk Board issued a warning on systemic cyber risk from frontier AI models. Frankfurt doesn't coordinate publications like that by accident.

There is a test that cuts through most AI vendor claims about autonomous fraud operationsin 30 seconds. Ask: “What is the hardest environment you have ever operated an autonomous system in?” If the answer is a controlled setting, a simulated benchmark, or a domain with fixed rules, you are looking at impressive engineering.