Redefining People Tracing and Finding

Press Release

192business launches its redeveloped people and business finding solution, 192 Trace, this week with the aim of transforming the way organisations are able to locate and investigate individuals & businesses.

The new tracing technology enables users to investigate a huge range of expanded datasets more intuitively with a user-friendly interface that allows the user to interrogate and investigate results and specify how they want to view search results.

The new datasets added to the 192 Trace service deliver over a quarter of a billion new records including the Electoral Roll back to 1997; the Insolvency Register; Mortality databases; Directory Enquiries data; the Births, Deaths & Marriages register back to 1984; Land Registry house sale price data ; Director & Shareholder reports (both active and inactive) and business databases from Dun & Bradstreet, Market Location, Local data Company, UK registered sole traders data and 192business own  ‘spider’ web data.

As part of the development programme for the new 192 Trace solution, 192business organised strategic client review forums with existing clients including local councils, DCA’s, bailiffs, central government departments, solicitors and utilities firms.  The result was that the debt recovery industry was able to specify tools, data and technology that they thought the industry was currently lacking.

“In the last five years we have redefined and led the identity verification industry. Based on feedback from our existing clients, such as debt recovery agencies, bailiffs , utilities, insurers and government departments, we’ve now applied our advanced search technology and design expertise to launch our new Trace and people-finding solution” said Grant Greenwood, product director at 192business.

 “Research from the Credit Services Association shows that Credit Services Association Members were referred some £20 Billion pounds worth of debt in 2009, representing in excess of 20 million individual debt cases and a staggering 15 million traces were carried out last year using the latest in trace technology.  Our new people-finding technology, 192 Trace will facilitate a quicker and easier search experience while allowing further investigation and analysis of matched records.”

192business are currently offering a free trial to companies interested in the product. For more information and to request a free trial email trace@192.com, visit www.192business.com/trace or call 020 7909 2192.

ENDS

Notes to Editors

192 Trace product update highlights include:

New search logic and search options:

-         Search for people and businesses using the same form using age range, phonetic, partial, radius, occupation and alias searching

-         Customise search options and which databases to search

-         Reference box and transaction log to track and save all searches

New result display options:

-         Customisable results function

-         List and table results display with sort and filter features

-         Tabbed searching - capacity to keep multiple search strings open

-         Function to export results for filing and analysing

New results details available:

-         History of addresses, co-occupants and neighbours including a timeline analysis tool

-         Results displayed in order of relevance according to data entered

-         Click into results for more details and greater depth of information

-         New details include residency, age, gender, nationality, property prices, and maps

192 Trace is ideal for:

-         Debtor Tracing

-         Asset Reunification

-         Background Investigation

-         Customer Trace

For more information, please contact Katy Wilkins at 192business:

Email: katy.wilkins@192.com

Fraud - The Cartoon

A fraudster closely linked to the now infamous carderplanet has been arrested in France and is now facing extradition to the USA.

Vladislav Anatolievich Horohorin, or BadB as he is known online was wanted for a number of financial crimes, and has been linked to carderplanet, carder.su and his own sites; dumps.name and badb.biz. By his own online admission Horohorin had been selling cards for around 8 years and claimed to be one of the biggest sellers of dumped card data online. 

However, perhaps more remarkably, are the promotional cartoons BadB produced, to promote his sites such as dumps.name. Wired magazine have published one of his videos shown below:

The cartoon shows a number of cards being stolen, along with victims’ reactions and a number of anti-American statements. Horohorin was indicted in the States in 2009 for device fraud charges and aggravated identity theft.

ID Fraud Increases: Home and Away

The latest figures from CIFAS report that ID fraud has increased in the first half of 2010; at an increase of almost 14% compared to 2009 figures. The largest increase is as a result of impersonation which grew at a rate of 22%. The increase is being blamed on increasingly difficult economic conditions, making it more difficult to obtain new credit services, and therefore making impersonation and account takeover more appealing.

Down under, the Australian Payments Clearing Association has released its fraud figures, which say that one in 3000 transactions is now fraudulent.

In addition card not present figures for Australia have increased by 20%and now cost merchants circa $89 million a year or around 33 cents in every $1,000 transacted.

Australia also has a big problem with skimming attacks, which have seen a massive jump from $5m to $17.5m on PIN only debit card transactions alone.

Western Australia and New South Wales is said to be the hotbed for POS attacks, with fraudsters able to capture card details and PINs before fraud is detected. APCA expect the figures to increase as new skimming fraud is detected but claim that the industry has acted quickly to limit the extent of the fraud. 

The figures show that fraud is increasingly a global problem, and that the trend for increasing levels of fraud remain constant across borders.

MP Calls on Prepaid Card Issuers

Labour MP Geraint Davies has called for an end to customer anonymity when purchasing prepaid cards. His ten minute rule motion argues that prepaid card schemes can be used to protect the anonymity of individuals buying child pornography.

Davies argues that by using a prepaid card, internet users can avoid being detected as pre-paid cards with a value under £100 do not require any id checks prior to purchase.

In his speech, available in full here, Davies uses the example of Operation Orr, where police investigated a number of conventional credit cards used to download child porn, which ultimately lead to 1750 convictions.

Prepaid credit cards do not offer the same audit trail, and the speech also notes that “the same cards are used by children to buy knives, alcohol etc on line”.

The motion calls for penalties to be imposed on debit and credit card providers and in addition to fines, calls for proof of identity and address to be obtained upon purchase of any prepaid card: “proof of identity and address would be required to buy pre-paid credit cards with passports, birth certificates, utility bills etc. We can’t just rely upon the credit card industry policing itself.”

Whilst passports are excellent proofs of identity, there are more robust ways of verifying and recording an identity than using a birth certificate or utility bill, and the motion requires a number of clarifications as to how it would work in practice; however it does once again draw attention to the potential for using prepaid cards for illegal activities.

The motion currently has the support of 55 MPs and was given an unopposed first reading.  It will have its second reading on November 19 2010.

Inside a Fraud Factory

HM Revenue & Customs (HMRC) have released a series of images giving an insight into the workings of a Ukranian crime gang, jailed for a £4.5m tax fraud.

The gang created thousands of fake identities using forged passports and other fake documents, which they then used to open 750 bank accounts in order to launder false tax repayments.

The Brentford based gang submitted over 1600 online self assessment tax forms claiming to be migrant workers who had overpaid tax whilst in the UK. In total they attempted to defraud HMRC by £8m, however many of the frauds were detected and payments stopped. However they still managed to make over £4million, which they used to buy fast cars and rent luxury city apartments.

As a result of a thorough HMRC investigation, officers searched seven properties in Brentford, and uncovered a production line of fraud. One address contained hundreds of bank cards, whilst another property contained National Insurance number application forms. Officers also recovered £360,000 in cash and a number of weapons.

As a result of the investigation 11 people were jailed for a total of over 40 years. HMRC have also released a number of photos illustrating the scale of the fraud, some of which are shown below:

Collection of forged passports, driving licenses and other ID documents. 

Blank credit cards seized.

Officers recovered over £360,000 in cash

The gang was known for a love of fast cars and expensive property.

Original HMRC Release