Capitec is intensifying its fraud prevention efforts, by deploying advanced intelligent systems to outpace emerging threats. Its latest wave of innovations includes an intelligent payment screening system that protected 113,410 clients from losing more than R699 million to fraud between July 2025 and June 2026.
Across personal and business banking, Capitec protects 26 million clients by using a broad set of tools – with more on the way.
In the past year, Capitec has identified and blocked over 131 000 suspicious beneficiary accounts, including 64 000 mule accounts and warned clients against more than 394 000 scam payments.
Before an EFT payment leaves a client’s account, every payment beneficiary is scored in real time.
Where other clients have previously reported a payment beneficiary, Capitec tracks and scores that information into a risk rating.
Clients see the rating, review the details and choose whether to proceed or cancel the payment with no pressure and no time limit.
“Our purpose has always been to make banking work for as many South Africans as possible,” says Blessing Mgaga, Executive Head: Group Risk Enablement & Client Integrity at Capitec.
“Every transaction is a signal of what clients value, and we want to keep building solutions that reflect what people actually need.”
Here are 8 innovations that are protecting Capitec clients:
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The Secret Safe allows clients to hide accounts from the app entirely, removing all access and the account from view, giving clients more control of their banking security. A hidden account can only be unlocked at a Capitec branch, meaning no remote access is possible, even if a phone is stolen or compromised. Since its launch a month ago, the feature has seen extremely strong adoption, with 75,000 accounts now secured. This demonstrates that clients are ready to take a more active role in protecting their finances.
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The Malware Detection tool in the Capitec app proactively scans clients’ phones for malware that are installed to intercept banking credentials and steal funds. When suspicious software is detected, the app identifies the specific apps posing a risk, alerts the client, and provides guidance on removing them before harm occurs.
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Trusted Approver is a security feature that is currently in development. It will allow clients to nominate a trusted person to approve payments before money leaves their account. The approver is notified through their Capitec app and has 12 hours to approve or decline. The Trusted Approver can also pause the client’s app and freeze their cards if needed, giving families and caregivers a meaningful role in protecting each other.
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Graph analytics technology links criminal networks by connecting the dots across their banking transactions, communications, and other systems. This helps Capitec to identify their targeted victims. The impacted client is warned that they’re communicating with fraudsters and any payment made is intercepted, thereby stopping the scam before it happens.
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The Scam Scanner is an innovative AI-powered feature designed to help clients instantly verify the legitimacy of suspicious SMSes and links received on their devices. Leveraging advanced artificial intelligence technology, the feature provides an additional layer of protection against evolving fraud threats. The feature will be available on the Capitec App in the coming weeks.
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Capitec Pulse, is an industry-first AI tool that provides branch consultants real-time contextual information about a client’s situation the moment they make contact through the Capitec app. This real-time visibility transforms how we defend clients. Consultants can now identify fraudulent transactions, unauthorised account access, and emerging threats instantaneously, stopping fraud before it happens. Our rapid response capability means we intercept threats in seconds, not hours, giving clients unmatched protection in the industry.
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Capitec Neo AI analyses real-time signals across the bank to identify and resolve client problems before they escalate, supporting real-time fraud detection, governance and proactive risk modelling. Rather than responding to fraud after it happens, Neo AI disrupts it at source by detecting anomalies, suspicious patterns, and emerging threats in real-time across thousands of transactions daily. This proactive intelligence protects clients at scale while strengthening Capitec’s governance framework.
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Capitec AI Donna accelerates Anti Money Laundering (AML) investigations by intelligently summarising critical information for specialist agents. This speed advantage enables faster investigations, resulting in quicker identification of suspicious activity, faster disruption of financial crime flows, and faster client protection. Donna’s impact appears directly in payment screening, which strengthens the ability to detect and prevent financial crime before funds move. “Financial crime is sophisticated and it moves fast,” says Mgaga. “We are always looking to build solutions that will disrupt the negative fraud flow and pace, using advanced fraud-detection models, cloud-based verification tools and behavioural analytics to keep clients safe.”
“Technology is always worth investing in, the key is ensuring that it continues to make a genuine difference to the people using it,” says Mgaga. “At Capitec our client’s safety is a top priority and an inordinate amount of time and effort will continue to support the protection of our clients.”
