Germany's Federal Financial Supervisory Authority supports international Operation Chargeback action against payment service provider abuse tied to EUR 300 million fraud

Germany's Federal Financial Supervisory Authority (BaFin) reported that it participated in an internationally coordinated law-enforcement operation on 4 November 2025 against three suspected globally operating fraud and money-laundering networks accused of systematically abusing payment service providers. The Koblenz Public Prosecutor’s Office Cybercrime Unit and the Federal Criminal Police Office led searches of more than 60 locations in nine countries and executed 18 arrest warrants, including five in Germany where 29 premises were searched with BaFin and tax-investigation support. BaFin linked the case to supervisory interventions in digital payments, including business restrictions and bans that it said had already fully halted the fraudulent activity since 2021. Investigators allege that between 2016 and 2021 the groups used credit card data from around 4.3 million cardholders in 193 countries to generate more than 19 million fictitious online subscriptions via professionally operated sham websites, typically charging small monthly amounts with unclear payment references. The suspects are also alleged to have compromised four large German payment service providers to inject the fraudulent transactions into the payment system, including the deployment at one provider of software programmed for money-laundering purposes; proceeds were then routed through numerous bank accounts in Germany, with more than 100,000 suspected money-laundering offences. The total damage is estimated at more than EUR 300 million, with a further roughly EUR 750 million in transactions not realised, and assets exceeding EUR 35 million were secured in Luxembourg and Germany; the investigation, opened in December 2020, targets 44 suspects and drew on pattern analysis by Germany’s Financial Intelligence Unit.