WooCommerce Anti-Fraud

WooCommerce Anti-Fraud checks for possible fraud whenever an order is placed through your store. The outcome of this check is the output of Risk Advise and Risk Scores. Furthermore, Artificial Intelligence based MaxMind’s minFraud services Integration with our plugin will give you an extra layer of security.

Important Note: If you have applied the settings per the documentation below and are still experiencing a large number of fraudulent orders, please contact us via WooCommerce.com Support channel and explain your situation as we can provide professional advice & support on these sorts of issues.

We also recommend checking the section below “Handling 100’s of fraudulent orders”

1. Download the .zip file from your WooCommerce account.
2. Go to: WordPress Admin > Plugins > Add New and Upload Plugin with the file you downloaded with Choose File.
3. Install Now and Activate the extensions.

More information at Install and Activate Plugins/Extensions.

In Anti-Fraud Settings, you can set these automated actions based on Risk Score:

• Cancel order
• Put an order on hold
• Send the administrator an email notification (but don’t change with the order status)
• Verify Paypal before sending the order for fraud prevention.
• Assess fraudulent activity with integrating minFraud® AI-based service by MaxMind. 

The automated action section also allows for a list of email addresses that are whitelisted from these automated actions. Enter one email address per line. Save changes.

The plugin is effective at stopping velocity attacks. But this is not the case when there is another problem on your site that is rendering it ineffective. A good analogy here is, imagine you have decided to increase security on your house by installing a deadlock on the door. You then leave home, but leaving the back door wide open. While there is increased security on the front door, it is only as effective as the weakest point in your home security.

To sum this up, where reCaptcha has been set up within our plugin, and the issue persists, it indicates one or more of the following:

-Your site has a general security vulnerability – such as non secure hosting.
-A plugin on your website has a security vulnerability.
-Your website has been hacked and is infected with malware.

Where this is the case, the plugin will not work effectively and you will continue to experience problems.

Next steps

OPMC works with both non technical ecommerce store owners, as well as developers and agency partners who are not specialised in security, to solve these issues.

We are therefore experienced in handling these various scenarios quickly and cost effectively. Please contact us through WooCommerce.com Support selecting this plugin and we can provide prompt expert advice to resolve this matter.

minFraud® Integration is an AI-based scoring system to check risk affiliated with orders you receive.

Signup for minFraud® fraud prevention service by visiting Maxmind minFraud Services here

After signing up, click My Account and select My License Key from tabs on  and then click Generate new license key

• Goto: WordPress Dashboard > WooCommerce > Settings > Anti Fraud > minFraud Settings 
• Check Enable MinFraud Settings and Device Tracking Settings
• Paste User ID and License key and Click Save changes at the bottom.

Authentication message will appear on the successful integration and you are all set up.

WooCommerce Anti-Fraud checks for possible fraud whenever an order is placed. The outcome of this check is the output of Risk Advise and Risk Score.

For Risk Advise:

• Low Risk – A Risk score lower than 25.
• Medium Risk – A Risk score between 25 and 75.
• High Risk – A Risk score higher than 75.

Risk Advise, Risk Score and a list of failed rules are added to the order edit display.

The Fraud Risk meta box

Risk Advise is also shown in the order overview screen as a colored shield, and the shield color is based on the level of Risk Advise.

Order overview

Risk Advise color key:

• Green – Low Risk
• Orange – Medium Risk
• Red – High Risk
• Grey – No fraud check is done

We created a set of rules that vary from simple checking if the shipping address matches the billing address to advanced rules such as proxy detection. We calculate a score based on the number of rules the order fails, then display Fraud Advise based on this score.

By navigating to WooCommerce > Settings and clicking the Anti-Fraud tab, you can configure how the plugin reacts to different risk scores.

• Admin Email Settings – Leave this on if you want WordPress to send you emails regarding the outcome of anti-fraud checks.

• Cancel score – This field allows you to determine when orders are automatically cancelled according to the score of their anti-fraud check. Orders with a risk score equal to or higher than the value entered will automatically be cancelled. By writing “0” in the field, this feature will be disabled and no orders will automatically be cancelled.

• On-hold score – This field is used to determine when an order is automatically put on hold. When an order’s risk score equals or exceeds this value, it will be placed on hold to be reviewed. By writing “0” in the field, this feature will be disabled and no orders will automatically be put on hold.
• Email notification score – Risk scores that meet or exceed this value will cause an email to be sent to your address.
  
• Medium and high-risk thresholds – This field allows you to change what the plugin classifies as a medium-level risk or a high-level risk.
• Enable first-order check – When enabled, the plugin will include a warning if the order placed is a user’s first order. The risk score will also be affected according to the rule’s risk weight.

• Enable first-order check for processing order – When the first-order is placed by a new client and the order enters into processing mode because of the low risk involved, enabling this field will reinitiate our anti-fraud algorithm for giving you an extra layer of protection. 

• Enable international order check – This setting checks if an order has been placed internationally. If it is, a warning is displayed and the risk score will be affected according to the rule’s weight.
• Enable IP geolocation check – When enabled, the plugin will look up the IP address of customers to determine their location. This information can help you detect illegitimate orders (eg. the IP location is in a different country to the shipping address).
  

• Enable Billing and Shipping address check – Enabling Billing and shipping address check will trigger this feature when there is a conflict between billing and shipping address. 

• Enable Proxy check – If a buyer is using a proxy to buy from your store, the antifraud plugin will add score set for this feature to other indicators when enabled.
  

• Enable suspicious domains check – By entering email domains (eg gmail.com, yahoo.com) into the “Suspicious Domains” field, the plugin can warn you when an order is placed using one of these addresses.
• Enable unsafe countries check – Countries marked on this list are considered suspicious by the plugin. You can select multiple countries by holding CTRL (Windows) or  ⌘ (Mac) when you are clicking them.
• Enable order amount check – Unusually large orders are a common sign of fake transactions. By enabling this setting, you will be warned when an order is placed that exceeds the cost in the “Amount limit” box.
• Check for attempt count – Enable this setting to check for multiple orders placed over short time spans (eg. 3 orders over 24 hours.
• IP multiple details check – When enabled, this setting will check if multiple orders have been placed over the same IP address. This is helpful for detecting users who are attempting to purchase with several different emails.

By adding an email to your blacklist, their purchases will automatically be detected as a high-risk.

By enabling automatic blacklisting, email addresses with a high risk of fraud will be added to this list automatically. You can also block individual email addresses by adding them to the list manually. Use this feature for fraudulent customers who you’ve had trouble with in the past.

• Enable PayPal verification – When this setting is active, all PayPal payments will require verification. A verified PayPal email address is linked with more legitimate, low-risk orders. If verification fails, the order is put on hold.
• Prevent downloads if verification fails – For WooCommerce stores which have digital downloads, this setting can be used to restrict access to the downloadable file(s) until the PayPal email is verified.

• Time spend before further attempts – This setting adjusts how many days are allowed to pass before another email is sent.

• Email body – This field allows you to customize the message that is sent to customers who need to verify their PayPal accounts.

By default Minimum MinFraud Risk Score for minFraud® integration is set to 30. It is the threshold value after which the minFraud alert is triggered in the WooCommerce antifraud plugin. Similarly, the default value of MinFraud Rule Weight is also set to 30, which is the weighting in proportion to the total per cent of fraud set for the minFraud. 

You can also customise your setting how it suits you. For example, you want minFraud to trigger when you get a score of 50, you have to set Minimum minFraud Risk Score to 50. Similarly, if you want to give minFraud more weighting, for example, 40 on Fraud risk graph that is displayed in your order then set MinFraud Rule Weight to 40.

Sign in to your MaxMind account. 

Goto MY ACCOUNT > minFraud Transactions

By clicking on the Transaction ID you can see for details of each order.

If the transaction score exceeds the threshold set in minFraud’s Rule Settings tab you‘ll see a notification on your order page. These scores are integrated with our already set scoring system that can check other aspects of fraud as well and gives you extra protection over the fraudulent activities. 

Orders that were placed prior to installing the Anti-Fraud extension can be manually checked by opening the order and clicking the Calculate Fraud Risk button in the Fraud Risk meta box.

The ‘Calculate Fraud Risk’ button.

Not receiving the administrator email can have multiple causes.

• Verify in WordPress default settings that the admin email address is entered correctly
• Check your SPAM folder to ensure the message was not filtered

If neither, contact your host to check if your website is allowed to send the email.