BPM Analytics

How can digital transformation help combat identity fraud?

The biggest causes of identity fraud are compromised credentials, cloud misconfiguration, and phishing. Intentional cyberattacks intend to exploit a system’s weakness to capture user data. Passive techniques lure innocent people into downloading a malicious file or entering their sensitive data into a form on a counterfeit website.

According to a leading computer security software company, cybercriminals stole the identity of over 15 million Americans in 2021. This resulted in Americans losing $52 billion of personal wealth.

This article will explain the types of identity fraud and digital transformation techniques to combat them.

Identity theft and its impact

Personal information, such as the name, date of birth, address, etc., provides sufficient information to a fraudster to create an identity clone. With a stolen identity, the fraudster can apply for and take loans, credit cards, and SIM cards. The thief can even impersonate a legitimate person to get state benefits.

While the fraudster has no intention to pay them back, the victim risks losing credibility and credit rating. You can lose money and find it difficult to get loans, mortgages, and credit cards.

Common ways fraudsters adopt to do identity theft is –

1. Phishing links to allure customers into divulging personal information
2. Credential stuffing from data breaches to access user accounts.
3. Unauthorised cyberattacks to deploy malicious software into a system.
4. Malicious links that use phishing to deploy malware in systems.
5. Keystroke recording to steal sensitive information like passwords.
6. Open-source intelligence (OSINT) uses information publicly available.
7. SIM-jacking to gain control of the potential victim’s number.
8. Sending fake social media requests to cheat customers’ friend lists or to send malicious links.
9. Hijacking customers’ email IDs and directing them to malicious web pages that log keystrokes.

Data breaches in larger organisations such as credit card or telephone companies and banks can have a catastrophic impact. While customers lose money, businesses lose credibility and trust.

Combating identity theft with digital transformation

In a survey by a leading research firm, 87% of business executives think customers have high trust in their business. But only 30% of their customers agree with the statement. Businesses that understand this gap are actively working to fill the gap by securing their customers’ identities with investments in digital transformation.

Integrated solutions that leverage massive customer data are necessary to combat identity theft. The top ways to prevent identity fraud in companies are –

1. Electronic signature.
2. Anti-fraud controls.
3. Certified communication.
4. RPA automation.
5. Authentication.
6. Identity verification.

A secure digital experience is essential to gain customers’ trust at every point in their journey. Your business must have a strong Know Your Customer (KYC) system that uses technology to prevent identity theft.

Businesses must define a privacy policy in line with their country’s laws and clearly display them on their website. A privacy policy that tells customers how their data is used helps businesses get trust and loyalty.

Deep data analytics proactively identifies and predicts potential identity thefts for investigation. Combating identity theft is not only an option but legal compliance for businesses across the globe.

For example, the General Data Protection Regulation (GDPR) is a European data protection and privacy regulation. One of the important clauses of GDPR is that businesses store customer information for a specific purpose and only for as long as it is necessary. Under GDPR, businesses must have appropriate technical measures such as two-factor authentication and end-to-end encryption for data security. Organisational measures for data protection include a data privacy policy, staff training, and limiting access to personal data.

For organisations on the digital transformation journey, agility is key in responding to a rapidly changing technology and business landscape. Now more than ever, it is crucial to deliver and exceed on organisational expectations with a robust digital mindset backed by innovation. Enabling businesses to sense, learn, respond, and evolve like a living organism, will be imperative for business excellence going forward. A comprehensive, yet modular suite of services is doing exactly that. Equipping organisations with intuitive decision-making automatically at scale, actionable insights based on real-time solutions, anytime/anywhere experience, and in-depth data visibility across functions leading to hyper-productivity, Live Enterprise is building connected organisations that are innovating collaboratively for the future.

How can Infosys BPM help?

Preventing identity fraud begins with harnessing and making sense of massive customer data stored in different systems. Infosys BPM uses a metric-driven approach and next-gen digital technology for reporting and analytics lifecycle through data extraction, visualisation, analysis, and insight generation. The services include –

1. Analytics-as-a-service.
2. Web & social media analytics.
3. Embedded analytics.
4. Financial services analytics.
5. Marketing & social analytics.
6. Fraud management.

Read more about the bpm analytics solutions at Infosys BPM.