Shopfitter BlogWebshop and e-commerce articles, hints and tips from Shopfitter.com

According to a report by the BBC today Shildon in County Durham has the highest incidence of fraudulent internet purchases. They cite internet Internet Security company The Third Man's research showing that 24% of all online purchases in Shilden were made using stolen credit card details.

Clearly, these figures are skewed by the actions of a small group of individuals who are very active, Shildon is a small town with a population of around 10,000. So anything they do make the figures look very bad, when in fact the percentage of the local population committing internet and card fraud is probably no higher than most places in the UK.

My advice is to treat this kind of report with a health warning but be wary of accepting orders that appear even the slighest bit out of the ordinary.

However, it does highlight that security and trust is still an issue in e-commerce. With an ever increasing number of webshops appearing and then, when the orders don't flood in, the businesses behind them disappearing but leaving the site live or simply taking money with no intention of fulfilling the order customer trust is going to be the next big issue for online traders to tackle.

There have been a number online trust marks set up, many of them check the validity of the webshop business at first application and award the trust mark when the fee has been paid.

However, many of these trust marks remain on the dormant website even though the business has folded, thereby giving a false sense of security to the online shopper.

If you decide to add a trust mark to your own online shop look for one that provides a live verification link so that your prospective customer can see up to date information about your trading status.

An example of this can be seen on a number of our users' sites; have a look at www.clootietree.com for an example of Checkrate's system.

As a final thought on this subject I'd like to say that our experience shows that the majority of online shoppers and businesses are trustworthy, rely on your instincts - if a sale seems dodgy then it probably is so decline it (ensure your sales terms have a clause declaring your right to refuse orders).