IMF Urges Banks to Strengthen Data Sharing to Fight Digital Fraud

As banking services, instant payments and crypto assets become increasingly digital, fraud rings can move funds across platforms and borders, while transaction and threat data remain siloed among banks. The International Monetary Fund said these information gaps weaken the financial sector’s collective ability to identify mule accounts and suspicious fund flows. Industry estimates put global fraud losses at about $1 trillion in 2024, making information sharing a financial-stability issue.

The IMF published Working Paper WP/26/62 on March 27, 2026, analyzing data from 162 countries and 20 industries. It found that the financial sector accounted for about 10% of cyber incidents over the past decade, with such incidents increasing tenfold. Cyber-enabled fraud worldwide reached about 2.5 million cases in 2022, nearly tripling over a decade. The IMF called for domestic and cross-border threat sharing among private-sector banks, standardized incident reporting and centralized fraud registries.