New FICO Technology Correlates Locations of Mobile Phone and Card Transaction to Crack Down on Fraud

SAN JOSE, Calif., Nov. 5, 2013 /PRNewswire/ -- FICO (NYSE:FICO), a leading predictive analytics and decision management software company, today announced the availability of a proximity correlation service for credit and debit card issuers aimed at improving the safety of payment card transactions. The FICO^® Proximity Location Service, part of FICO^® Fraud Resolution Manager, compares the physical location of a cardholder's registered mobile phone against the location of the ATM or point-of-sale terminal where the card is being used. Based on the proximity, a cardholder account can be blocked or cleared for further activity.

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In trials of the service with UK card accounts, the ability to perform this proximity matching reduced the number of "false positives" (genuine transactions investigated because they appear to be fraudulent) on international transactions by as much as 70 percent. Several UK banks are now developing deployment plans for the new FICO service, which has been developed in partnership with ValidSoft, a wholly owned subsidiary of Elephant Talk Communications Corp. (NYSE MKT: ETAK).

"Customer service is one of the driving forces behind improving fraud protection today," said Gabriel Hopkins, senior director, Product Management at FICO. "Banks are trying to perfect a tricky balancing act – protect customers without causing undue frustration for cardholders who travel or who use their cards in new locations. Proximity correlation adds a powerful new tool that can help banks eliminate a great source of frustration for their customers who travel. With this service, cardholders can use their cards in other countries with significantly lower risk of being declined."

FICO^® Fraud Resolution Manager is an automated, two-way communications service that processes fraud cases by leveraging intelligent data assessment, advanced decision management and customer intervention. It gives organizations the scalability to process high volumes of cases simultaneously, performing investigations, shaping customer action and contact strategies, and reaching resolution in seconds. FICO Fraud Resolution Manager can be seamlessly integrated with FICO®Falcon®Fraud Manager, the world's leading platform for credit fraud management, which protects 2.5+ billion card transactions a year.

About FICO
FICO (NYSE: FICO), formerly known as Fair Isaac, is a leading analytics software company, helping businesses in 80+ countries make better decisions that drive higher levels of growth, profitability and customer satisfaction. The company's groundbreaking use of Big Data and mathematical algorithms to predict consumer behavior has transformed entire industries. FICO provides analytics software and tools used across multiple industries to manage risk, fight fraud, build more profitable customer relationships, optimize operations and meet strict government regulations. Many of our products reach industry-wide adoption — such as the FICO^® Score, the standard measure of consumer credit risk in the United States. FICO solutions leverage open-source standards and cloud computing to maximize flexibility, speed deployment and reduce costs. The company also helps millions of people manage their personal credit health. FICO: Make every decision count^™. Learn more at www.fico.com.

For FICO news and media resources, visit www.fico.com/news.

About ValidSoft
ValidSoft provides advanced mobile and cloud security solutions. ValidSoft has developed a custom-built sophisticated multi-factor authentication platform (SMART™) for the mobile world, which takes full advantage of mobile telecommunication channels and devices and includes a leading proprietary voice biometric engine. These solutions combat electronic fraud and safeguard consumer privacy across internet and mobile banking, credit/debit-card and (mobile and fixed line) telephony channels. ValidSoft's solutions are used to verify the authenticity of both parties to a transaction (Mutual Authentication), ensure the fidelity of telecommunication channels (Secure Communications), and confirm the integrity of transactions themselves (Transaction Verification) – in each case in a manner which is scalable for the mass market, cost-effective, secure and easy to use and deploy. The company counts some of the world's largest financial institutions among its customers. ValidSoft is the only security software company in the world that has been granted three European Privacy Seals. Visit: www.validsoft.com.

FICO, Falcon and "Make every decision count" are trademarks or registered trademarks of Fair Isaac Corporation in the US and other countries.

SOURCE FICO