Employing digital tools to stay one step ahead of fraudsters – beyond traditional credit scoring and rating models

Fraud has always been a cat-and-mouse game where investigators try to keep up with increasingly sophisticated criminals. In the digital age, this has only ramped up even further.

As the local product owner of Bisnode Compliance offering in Sweden, Johan Forss is well acquainted with the schemes employed by fraudsters – and the most effective ways to outsmart them. “Fraud is a constant problem in today’s society. The methods used by criminals are often sophisticated, and through an organized, well-planned approach, they have many times been able to swindle their victims out of large sums of money. The fraudsters know how to game the system, which means that you can’t simply rely on traditional credit information if you want to beat them.”

How to spot fraudsters and tear down their facade

One common tactic among criminals is to establish and build up a front company over the course of several years, with false documentation. “The fraudsters who succeed in this start with the things that they dont’t think anyone will notice, and which are hard for our customers to spot. On paper, everything looks fine. They main focus is to build up this façade,” Forss notes.

A powerful tool to tear down that façade is Bisnode’s Decisioning solutions, including pattern recognition and risk monitoring. “We are able to flag suspicious companies – ‘this is high risk, you need to look at this further’,” Forss explains. “We can detect different aspects which together create a very suspicious pattern.” To identify potentially fraudulent companies, Bisnode’s pattern recognition analyzes a wide number of data points to detect deviant behavior and abnormal figures, including unexplained spikes in turnover, and association with other high-risk companies. This results in a more efficient, automated and precise risk assessment process.

Apply logic to identify high-risk factors

In addition to this, Bisnode’s Decisioning product is also able to weed out suspicious parties at the initial onboarding stage. “Decisioning gives you access to data sources which are suited to the way you perform credit assessment. We also apply additional logic in order to identify high-risk factors during the onboarding process. By acting on the high-risk signals conveyed by the Decisioning system, you can ensure that the business relationship is not predicated on false evidence.” This is bolstered by the ability to incorporate a client’s bank account data into the assessment process, as well as conducting AML checks to uncover other warning signs.

Used in conjunction, these tools and services enable you to quickly green-light safe clients, optimizing your anti-fraud efforts by focusing them on the cases where further investigation is actually necessary. And you can do this with the confidence that Bisnode provides the data you need to make informed decisions, when you need it – as numerous businesses have already discovered.