Synectics seeking to increase clarity around digital ID and insurance fraud

Synectics Solutions is launching a podcast as part of an ongoing effort to increase clarity and public understanding of fraud and digital identity issues.

The Fraud Diaries will debut with a three-part video series in collaboration with insurer Allianz UK to discuss trends in fraud and its prevention within the commercial insurance market.

Fraud prevention and digital identity are both topics with widely-held misconceptions, and Synectics efforts to combat them, in addition to the podcast, include shared insights into the insurance fraud landscape and panel appearances like one at the TechUK Digital ID Summit 2024 in November.

The company explained in a recent post to its website that 80 percent of insurance data is held in the form of unstructured documents, which therefore cannot be analyzed with fraud detection tools. While not necessarily intuitive for consumers, insights about data formatting and cross-sector intelligence signals sharing are easier to understand than the use of AI-powered predictive analytics to improve claims processing. The inclusion of weighted confidence scores for decision-making is saving businesses money, Synectics says in another post explaining the concept to relying parties.

UK digital ID adoption is confusing to users

The UK government is hoping that identity products will bring as much as £700 million (US$890.9 million) a year to the UK economy. The issue now, however, is not which markets are benefiting from digital ID products, it is how users are benefitting from them, Frank Joshi, managing director of identity orchestration platform Mvine, said at the Digital ID Summit in London.

“Corporates are doing well, sectors are doing well – individuals are not doing well. When we talk about getting greater adoption, it’s confusing,” Joshi said during a panel discussion on digital ID adoption.

People are finding it hard to figure out the multitude of digital ID apps used for accessing different services. This may make it easier for big tech companies that offer more simplified logins and user experiences.

“I think the biggest driver adoption will be customer convenience,” says Adrian Field, director of market development at identity service OneID.

People use services such as Google login because they are convenient, even though they know the services are collecting data, according to Synectics Head of Solutions Chris Lewis.

The UK government has been making efforts to assure users that identity products are safe for their privacy. Its main tool for this is the Digital Identity and Attributes Trust Framework (DIATF) used for certifying digital ID services and issuing trust marks through the newly opened Office for Identities and Attributes.

The upcoming Data (Use and Access) Bill, currently discussed in Parliament, will also support the creation and adoption of trusted digital verification services from certified providers in the UK.

These efforts mean that the industry is moving in the right direction, according to Shelley Langan-Newton. The CEO of digital ID and eKYC company SQR compared the introduction of the digital ID trust framework to the standardization of the Internet.

“The internet became widely adopted because it allowed us to send things across wide distances. But while the internet connected us it did not protect us,” she says. “Putting that layer of protection on top of that connectivity layer is hugely important, and the way that telecoms did that was through standardization.”

As with the internet, standards in digital identity will push interoperability forward. But simply introducing regulatory frameworks may not be enough to draw in users, according to panelists.

“We put a lot of weight on things like a trust mark and I think that’s not going to suddenly make everyone buy digital IDs and buy services or integrate digital IDs,” says Lewis.

According to recently published surveys, such as those from Careful Industries, the public is generally favorable towards the idea of digital IDs. The UK press also gave its support during the national debate on the topic.

Ensuring products are safe through government regulation will have an impact but consumers are most likely to be drawn to digital ID applications where they see benefits. One of these areas is travel and hospitality as all frequent flyers know travel can be exhausting, adds Chris Tate, CEO of Condatis, a Microsoft Entra Identity Partner.

“People are going to look for something this easy and value-adding,” says Tate. “ Government interaction and proving yourself is one aspect, but actually there’s a whole bunch of other economic drivers which are going to make identity verification way more compelling and accelerate the market.”

Article Topics

BFSI  |  consumer adoption  |  digital ID  |  digital identity  |  fraud prevention  |  Synectics Solutions  |  UK