The ninth edition of the DIGI PAY conference will take place on October 8 at Inter Expo Center, bringing together over 300 professionals from the financial sector, business, and institutions to analyze the transformation of financial crime in the era of artificial intelligence and instant payments.
According to the Occupational Fraud 2026 study by the international organization ACFE, internal fraud causes serious damage to businesses, leading to a loss of approximately 5 percent of their annual revenue. On a global scale, these financial leakages reach 5 trillion dollars every year. The primary driver of this fraud is data leakage within the organizations themselves.
A paramount challenge facing the sector is real-time fraud. The traditional model, in which financial institutions manage crime at two speeds—combining real-time monitoring with periodic audits and batch processing—is undergoing a fundamental shift. Instant payments impose extremely tight timeframes on institutions of just a few seconds. In this context, the Verification of Payee (matching the name and IBAN) is becoming a mandatory process. "The problem arises when a customer receives too many mismatch alerts," commented Goran Angelov, CEO of IBS Bulgaria, as quoted in the announcement.
The development of digital identity and new payment standards will affect the security of financial transactions for all consumers in the region.
Another massive risk to the future of business relates to identity theft and the subsequent leakage of sensitive data. As mobile wallets and tokenized cards turn the smartphone into the primary tool for accessing the financial world, digital identity is establishing itself as the new "gateway" to financial services. To create a new layer of trust, Europe is working on the implementation of the European Digital Identity Wallet (EUDI Wallet). By the end of 2026, every member state must provide its citizens with such an EUDI Wallet, and the financial sector will be required to use it for reliable identity authentication.