As fraudsters shift between contact channels, real-time phone-number intelligence gives insurers a decisive edge in detecting fraud before it escalates, writes Jamie Melling.
This article was originally published in Insurance Post.
Insurance fraud is difficult to track. Fraudsters today switch easily between web, mobile apps and contact centre, exploiting whichever route offers the least resistance to make bogus policy applications and claims.
This creates a difficult challenge for insurers’ fraud teams, as they struggle to identify suspicious activity earlier, before losses occur and investigations escalate.
However, one area of focus for fraud prevention that is bringing increasing value for Smartnumbers customers is the data from calls to the contact centre. Historically viewed as operational information, telephony interactions are emerging as a powerful source of actionable fraud intelligence.
Calls provide actionable fraud intelligence
Fraudsters frequently interact with contact centres, even when the fraudulent activity ultimately completes elsewhere. They use calls to bypass tighter digital controls and gather policyholder information, manipulate agents into amending policy details or initiate payments. These calls leave signals that can be used to catch them.
The caller’s number and other associated data can enable insurers to link fraud investigations across customer channels, policies, claims and business lines. A single phone number may connect multiple applications, identities or fraud events that would otherwise appear unrelated.
Fraudsters often follow the same communication patterns across multiple attacks and, while ‘customer’ identities, payment details or devices may change, phone numbers frequently remain the same. This makes keeping track of calls from specific phone numbers particularly important.
When insurers – or any kind of company for that matter – treat phone numbers as risk identifiers, their fraud teams can surface patterns of suspicious behaviour that are otherwise difficult to detect. And it enables them to move away from investigating isolated incidents and towards building a connected picture of organised activity.
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Unmasking hidden numbers
The telephony channel remains attractive to fraudsters because organisations often lack a way to carry out security checks on incoming calls in real time. Perpetrators take advantage by withholding or spoofing their caller ID to operate under the radar and avoid detection.
But when insurers can identify the true number behind incoming calls in real time, which is what Smartnumbers enables, they gain access to an important intelligence opportunity.
Once uncovered, phone numbers can be cross-checked against the insurer’s internal denylists, details from previous fraud investigations, and intelligence made available in the platform by other Smartnumbers customers.
Access to this kind of shared intelligence is particularly useful when the data comes from companies that span multiple sectors.
Analysis of the caller data from one insurer showed that around a third of the fraud they identify originates from phone numbers first flagged as suspicious by banks, for example. In other words, a number identified during a banking fraud investigation may later appear in insurance policy applications, claims activity or contact centre interactions. Without access to shared intelligence, those connections would be missed.
To understand more about Smartnumbers solutions and what they could mean for your fraud prevention strategy, get in touch or download our in-depth report for the insurance sector.
