Preventing Synthetic Fraud with Biometric Facial Recognition Match and Liveness Testing

Fraud prevention and detection technology is advancing, but so is fraud. The acceleration of the adoption and deployment of digital and remote solutions in almost every industry has been an opportunity for fraudsters and we are seeing the rise of synthetic identities, identity spoofing, identity theft and deepfakes (real looking photos or videos created through AI).

Ineffective Technology Endangers Your Business

With any transaction you want to ensure a secure experience for your customers and your business while also complying with industry regulations. There is no shortage to the different types of fraud that can take place due to the use of stolen identities (account takeover and reactivation, identity theft, muling, financial elder abuse, etc.). As these exploitations become more pervasive in our increasingly digital economy, the emphasis on protecting Personally Identifiable Information (PII) and ensuring secure transactions for both businesses and consumers is more critical than ever before.

e-Commerce merchants experienced a 67% rise in synthetic identities in the first half of 2020.

LexisNexis® Risk Solutions 2020 True Cost of Fraud^TM Study: E-commerce/Retail Edition (July 2020)

Siloed Verification Solutions Facilitate Synthetic Fraud

Certain technologies, though accurate and effective on their own, are most powerful when used together rather than in a siloed manner. For example, One-to-One biometric facial recognition matching can detect if a face matches the image on the provided ID while accompanying document authentication determines that the provided ID itself is authentic. Separately these technologies cannot verify that the identity of the person presenting the ID and the face presented are one and the same.

Additionally, determining if the person claiming the identity is indeed a real person and is the person present at the time of the transaction is another key factor of identity verification. Identity verification solutions that utilize document authentication, biometric facial recognition match and liveness testing in one workflow will be the most successful in fighting fraud.

Benefits of Passive Liveness Testing for Identity Verification

Liveness testing provides an additional security layer to establish genuine presence. Determining if the person claiming the identity is indeed a real person and present at the time of the transaction is another key factor of identity verification. However, liveness tests that require user interaction such as blinking or smiling to verify a person’s genuine presence not only create friction for customers but can also alert fraudsters. This type of test can give them a heads up and enable them to be more successful in spoofing attempts.

Incorporating liveness testing can also remove the need for additional steps such as Knowledge Based Authentication (KBA) or requiring more than one government-issued ID for verification.

Acuant’s Trusted Identity Platform uses machine learning to provide a comprehensive solution to fight fraud across all industries. Acuant’s FaceID and AssureID™  seamlessly integrate powerful biometric facial recognition match and liveness detection with patented document authentication for highly accurate and real time identity verification and fraud prevention.

Read Our Guide to Learn More About Passive Liveness.