Credit Card Fraud Could Result In Eight Years Prison
Credit card fraud is rampant in Costa Rica and thanks to the lack of measures and stiff laws that punish those types of crimes. However, that could all change soon.

Legislative deputy, Lorena Vásquez, of the Partido Unidad Social Cristiana (PUSC), has presented a bill to amend the current laws and punish severely those who commit credit card fraud.

The bill would reform the Código Penal (Penal Code) creating three types of crimes: credit card fraud, stealing credit card information for the purpose of copying or duplicating a credit card, and altering or manipulating credit information to withdraw money on deposit by fraudulent electronic means.

Credit card fraud, that includes using false or stolen identity to obtain a credit card, would be punished from one to four years in prison.

Information fraud with credit cards, that incudes the stealing of credit information then used to duplicate or copy a credit card that would then be used by another person other than the credit card holder would be punished from one to six years in prison.

And manipulating or modifying bank account information, either personal or business, with the intent to withdraw monies on deposit fraudulenty would see sanctions of one to eight years in prison.

Legislator Vásquez said that during the last three years there has been a sharp increase in these types of crimes and it is about time for some changes.

According to the Departamento de Estadística del Organismo de Investigación (statistics department of the OIJ - judicial investigation authorities) there were 379 reported fraud cases in 2004 and 383 in 2005.

The OIJ says that that last year it received 338 complaints of stolen credit card information, along with cases of credit card falsification and the use of the internet to empty out bank accounts or manipulate automate teller machines, using stolen information.

Currently there are several hundred different types of credit cards offered by Costa Rican banks and financial institutions, with interest rates ranging from the BCR's lowest of 28% to as high as 60%.