New York AG sues Zelle parent company, alleging lack of fraud safeguards

New York Attorney General Letitia James filed a lawsuit Wednesday against Early Warning Services, or EWS, alleging the parent company of Zelle failed to implement certain safeguards, causing "catastrophic harm to millions of consumers" and allowing fraudsters to steal more than $1 billion from 2017 to 2023.

EWS, which is co-owned by Bank of America, Capital One, JPMorgan Chase, PNC Bank, Truist, U.S. Bank and Wells Fargo, launched the Zelle app in 2017. At its debut, Zelle said the digital payment network would be a "faster, safer way" for people to send and receive payments "within the security of their financial institution," according to the company.

As of 2024, the app has 151 million users, according to Zelle's website.

The push to launch Zelle led to design oversights that made the network "an obvious conduit for fraudulent activity," the lawsuit alleges. Those alleged flaws include Zelle's quick registration process and lack of verification, which James claims made it easy for scammers to infiltrate the service.

The limited information shown to customers during transactions also allowed fraudsters to use false or fraudulent email addresses to trick consumers, she said.

"EWS knew from the beginning that key features of the Zelle network made it uniquely susceptible to fraud, and yet it failed to adopt basic safeguards to address these glaring flaws or enforce any meaningful anti-fraud rules on its partner banks," the New York AG's office claimed in its statement.

The lawsuit also alleges that EWS failed to enforce rules to prevent fraud, even though it knew its partner banks were violating them.

In a statement to CBS News, a Zelle spokesperson called the lawsuit a "political stunt" and said it was a "copycat" of a similar lawsuit the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau filed in December, which was dismissed in March. That lawsuit alleged EWS failed to protect consumers from widespread fraud.

The lawsuit seeks restitution and damages for New Yorkers affected by fraud on Zelle, as well as a court order requiring the company to maintain anti-fraud measures.