August 2023 Summaries

Large-scale digital fraud is increasing in scale and sophistication, exposing financial institutions, merchants, and consumers to data theft, identity fraud, account takeovers, chargebacks, and emotional and financial harm. The source cites ransomware, widespread cybercrime, and projected global ecommerce fraud losses exceeding $48 billion in 2023, while noting that overly strict anti-fraud controls can also harm legitimate customers through false transaction declines. It presents Socure’s Sigma Identity fraud solution as a progressive identity-verification system that uses machine learning and data analytics to balance fraud prevention with lower customer friction. In a cited retail card portfolio case, the solution reportedly reduced false-positive denials by about 61% and identified roughly 23% more fraudulent actors than the client’s previous provider after fraud rates rose sharply, supporting the company’s argument that advanced identity tools can improve both security and customer experience.

Public, a New York-based multi-asset investment platform, has launched in the United Kingdom, offering U.K. members access to more than 5,000 U.S.-listed equities, low foreign-exchange fees, commission-free trading during U.S. market hours, and market data and analytics. The company uses Socure’s document-verification technology during account opening, including Predictive DocV 3.0 for cases requiring additional validation, to support secure and streamlined onboarding. Public said retaining Socure as it expanded helped simplify its infrastructure by continuing with an established U.S. partner. The platform offers investing in stocks, treasuries, ETFs, cryptocurrencies, and alternative assets, while noting that investments carry risk and may lose value.

As online account opening expands, organizations face increasingly sophisticated identity fraud and need reliable verification throughout onboarding, returning-customer checks, and high-risk transactions. Traditional escalation methods for applicants with limited digital footprints, such as knowledge-based authentication and manual review, can be inaccurate, vulnerable to breached data, costly, and disruptive to customer experience. Socure promotes its automated Predictive DocV 3.0 solution as an alternative that combines ID document authenticity checks, forensic analysis, data extraction, and selfie-to-ID matching to verify identities in under four seconds. The system can support step-up verification for uncertain applicants, document-first onboarding for new-to-country customers, and authentication or re-authentication for suspected account takeovers or high-value transactions, aiming to reduce fraud and operational costs while increasing approvals of legitimate customers.