Voice or telephony fraud is prevalent across not just the UK but the entire globe. Thus, it’s encouraging to see the regulator giant Ofcom spreading the word and warning consumers of the multitude of tricks and tactics used by fraudsters, including the spoofing of caller IDs to disguise their identity or impersonate an organisation.

Over the last few years, consumers have been spending far more time on the phone, some using their personal phones for work for instance. Consequently, safeguards have been lowered. Fraudsters can use the telephony channel to verify an individual’s credentials before going to commit fraudulent activity.

It’s vital for consumers to be alert.  The two pieces of advice I always give are:

1) always verify who you are speaking to, especially if they call you,

and

2) if still in doubt, don’t give away any personal information or payment details and instead, hang up, and call the company’s customer services team on their official contact number.

For organisations, the call centre is targeted at many points throughout a fraudster’s journey. Fortunately, developments in machine learning and artificial intelligence have led to extremely effective fraud detection and customer authentication tools that must be considered by every call centre. These tools not only help protect the customer but also provide a much-enhanced customer experience.