Pace Of Growth Scuttles Anti-Fraud Measures

The Asia Pacific Fraud Management Insights - 2017, prepared by Experian in association with IDC, highlights the prevalence of identity theft and other fraud trends in India. Vaishali Kasture, MD, Experian Credit Bureau and country head, Experian India, discusses the report and outlines remedial measures:

N. Mohan: Vis a vis the findings in the Asia Pacific Fraud Insights Report -2017, where do Indian banks and financial institutions stand in terms of their capability to fight frauds?

Vaishali Kasture: I think when we look at the various sectors, Indian banks have taken cue from their global counterparts. They have set up dedicated teams and installed necessary hardware/software because they are aware of frauds and they know that they need to invest in anti-fraud systems as they have suffered because of frauds. The BFSI sector is usually the guiding beacon of all the changes that happen and the other sectors sort of just follow in any kind of change, especially in technology, in terms of fraud, in terms of analytics. So, it is at the forefront of this change. I think there is lot of investment and thought going into fraud management and they recognize that fraud is key, and fraud is imperative especially in a scenario of modernization of the banking system, digitization, their wanting to become paperless, friction-free, etc. It is obvious that there are elements of this which makes the banking system more open to frauds. Even in paper-based systems, there are lot of frauds happening. So, I am of the view that banks today are prepared, they are investing in systems and they know no matter how much you do, the fraudsters are one step ahead.

As banking systems get more intelligent, so do the hackers. There is a realization of this aspect. Of course, there are lacunae. They are also aware of solutions available i - for example at Experian, we have a fraud detection tool Hunter, which can predict fraud patterns and alert banks of a seemingly likely fraud happening. Hunter works by telling banks and insurance companies that there is an intention to commit a fraud on the part of a customer.

Do you think Indian banks are lagging their international counterparts?