Credit card fraud is getting faster—and so is the fight to stop it. Mastercard just announced a new fraud detection system powered by artificial intelligence that can intercept fraudulent charges before they even happen. That’s not science fiction. It’s already rolling out in 2025.
A New Way to Spot Fraud: Before It Hits the Bank
Mastercard’s latest tool taps into years of transaction data, analyzing spending patterns across more than 125 billion transactions annually. It works in real time, sending alerts to banks about suspicious activity before the charge gets approved.
What makes this different from the fraud filters merchants are used to? It’s network-wide. Mastercard can detect threats across banks, merchants, and cardholders—all at once. That means it’s not just looking at one customer’s unusual behavior but comparing it to fraud trends across the entire ecosystem.
Instead of chasing fraud after it happens, Mastercard is now aiming to stop it before it ever hits your system.
Why This Matters for Merchants
Fraudulent transactions don’t just hurt consumers—they trigger costly chargebacks for businesses. Mastercard says its new system will help reduce false declines and prevent fraudulent charges from being approved in the first place. That could mean fewer chargebacks tied to stolen cards, bots, and testing attacks.
For merchants, this is a shift. Rather than relying solely on your own fraud tools or post-sale alerts, there’s now a protective layer happening before the payment is even finalized. It’s designed to reduce fraud at the root, where approvals happen.
What Mastercard Is Saying
Mastercard’s president of cyber and intelligence, Ajay Bhalla, called the rollout a “step change” in how fraud is managed. In his words, this new layer adds “decision intelligence” at the transaction level.
He claims it’s the first time Mastercard has been able to use its full network data to intervene during the transaction, not after. If that proves true, it could dramatically reduce chargebacks tied to unauthorized purchases.
What Merchants Should Watch
This isn’t a plug-and-play solution for merchants just yet. It’s built for issuers and financial institutions first, but Mastercard says it’ll be expanding access and reach over time. That means changes could be coming to your fraud workflows, whether you’re ready or not.
For now, merchants should monitor approval rates, watch for shifts in false positives, and stay alert to how banks might change their fraud rules based on this update. It could impact how disputes are evaluated—and how quickly they’re resolved.
It’s Time to Stay Ahead of Chargebacks
Chargeback fraud doesn’t wait. Even with better fraud tools upstream, merchants still need a plan for what slips through the cracks. Chargeblast helps you fight disputes, prevent policy abuse, and stay one step ahead of chargeback cycles—without waiting for the bank to make a move.
Let us help you stop preventable chargebacks at the source. Explore how Chargeblast fits into your fraud prevention stack.
