Let’s Get Physical (and Digital): The Path to Speedy ID Verification

The days of sluggish ID verification are over

Deduce recently completed a comprehensive evaluation for a leading identity verification (IDV) platform. The deep-dive proved what we already knew to be true: uniting digital and physical identities is one of the fastest and most accurate ways of verifying the identity of new customers during the account creation workflow.

Digital and physical familiarity with a user is especially crucial in regulated industries, such as banking. Big banks call upon IDV vendors to verify legitimate users and catch bad actors, but these solutions don’t always have the real-time digital identity intelligence necessary to detect fraud at scale, or the data they rely on during the verification steps may be out of date and lead to false positive declines or costly manual reviews.

Here is a closer look at how Deduce is powering the future of digital identity verification.

It all starts with visibility

The unification of digital and physical identity, or a user’s online footprint and physical location, isn’t possible without a hefty chunk of consumer web data. Deduce’s identity graph, the largest in the US, has this data in droves: 500 million unique identity profiles and 1.4 billion daily online activities sourced from more than 150K websites and apps.

In short, Deduce sees most of the US transactional population multiple times per week. For this particular data study, many of the 69K identity profiles provided had appeared on Deduce’s Identity Network hundreds of times before (shopping, gaming, banking, etc.). Further, more than 80% of the applicants’ emails showed up on Deduce’s network, and nearly 8 out of 10 seen emails were linked to a familiar geography, IP, or network.

Matching a customer’s profile with their observed consumer behavior on Deduce’s network—in real time—gives IDVs, as well as fraud platforms, a significant edge. Coupling this with accurate, and much faster, network and geography verification is the coup de grâce for fraudsters committing identity theft or synthetic identity fraud.

The dynamic duo: digital & physical identity

The combo of digital and physical familiarity, plus Deduce’s real-time behavioral analysis, neutralizes the threat of identity fraud. Crucially, it also protects legitimate customers from the drudgery of manual review. Imagine applying for a bank account or time-sensitive loan that you need approved in hours, even minutes, and not hearing back for days.

In the case of a bank account application, for example, an applicant’s first and last name is typically cross-referenced with their current address. However, if they recently moved, this would likely result in a false positive for identity fraud—and a subsequent manual review—as many consumer databases take weeks to update. Deduce mitigates such an error by checking the applicant’s email against trust signals such as IP and device ID to confirm a user’s location, returning another trust signal known as “Familiar Geo.”

This is great news for any regulated industry, where regulatory compliance requires them to Know Your Customer (KYC). Dodging manual reviews cuts labor costs (~$100 per review), shortens time to approval, and stops customers from jumping ship.

The IDV evolution is here

Digital and physical familiarity coupled with malicious activity detection is a sure-fire path to customer delight and fraudster chagrin. With Deduce’s trust and risk signals, IDVs and fraud platforms can sniff out email chicanery and identity fraud while facilitating the customer journey and curtailing chargeback risk. Even customers with little to no credit history, or thin file applicants, such as students, can be more accurately identified.

For regulated industries in particular, knowing where a customer is goes a long way in determining who a customer is. Deduce’s robust layer of trust has all of the information IDVs need—well before the verification process takes place.

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Want to see how Deduce can expedite your identity verification? Contact us today and get up and running in no time.