From malware and phishing to expansive distributed denial-of-service attacks, the sophistication, scale, and impact of cyberattacks have evolved significantly in recent years. With data breach as the new normal, organizations must adopt stronger, more advanced technical solutions to protect sensitive data. While enhanced technology is necessary for defending against data breaches, it cannot work independently of precautionary, often-overlooked measures like risk assessment, threat information sharing, or employee awareness and education. Even with the most cutting-edge defense systems in place, companies can’t underestimate the importance of employing fundamental security practices to mitigate cyber threats. In a climate where the risk of a data breach continues to grow, preparation is critical. “The Fifth Annual Study: Is Your Company Ready for a Big Data Breach?,” sponsored by Experian Data Breach Resolution and conducted by the Ponemon Institute, examines how organizations stack up in data breach preparedness. Organizations can help mitigate risk by employing the below best practices: Manage third-party risks: A cyberattack on partners or vendors can have dire consequences for an organization, regardless of how exhaustive its own security measures may be. The risk resulting from a third-party’s lax security measures is too great to ignore. However, only 48 percent of organizations conduct assessments on third-party cybersecurity tactics. Regularly review response plans: The threat and severity of data breaches are continually changing. Keeping a pulse on vulnerabilities is vital for any company. However, 40 percent of respondents say they don’t have scheduled times to review and update their data breach response plan. A staggering 26 percent report not reviewing or updating their organization’s plan after implementation. Opt-in to software updates: Outdated software exposes areas susceptible to infiltration, increasing a company’s risk of attack. Despite such risk, only 26 percent of respondents say employees are required to update software systems regularly. Organizations should require that all employees have the most up-to-date software available. Educate, educate, educate: Data breaches caused by employee negligence are a concern of 80 percent of respondents. Because of their access to a company’s computers, systems, and networks, employees must be actively involved in an organization’s data breach defense. Organizations should conduct regular training and awareness programs on the consequences of mishandling sensitive confidential information. Data breach preparedness is a multifaceted effort that requires cross-company support and involvement. Organizations can’t rely solely on technological solutions to thwart cyber threats. Having a solid response team in place and a well-defined process are fundamental elements of a data breach response plan that, though seemingly basic, should never be overlooked. Download our Fifth Annual Data Breach Preparedness Study

As the world celebrates International Women's Day on March 8, we want to shine a light on a few of the female leaders who shape, inspire and grow Experian. From sales to strategy, to people management, big data and beyond, women are a driving force in every industry - and their stories deserve to be told. Throughout the week, meet some of the "Women of Experian." Today, we feature Monica Peace, a sales leader who connects daily with some of the biggest players in financial services. Learn about her career journey, learnings and sources of inspiration as it pertains to leadership. What do you do at Experian? What’s a typical day like for you?   I lead the sales team for the West Coast Preferred Channel. Our clients are comprised of key regional banks, fintechs, online lenders and indirect automotive lenders.  One of the things I love about my job is that my days vary greatly depending on client or team needs and activities.  Typical activities include internal meetings on aligning our solutions with go to market strategy, customizing solutions for some of our larger client needs, and ensuring our sales team have the training or tools to do their job effectively. Along with the internal activities there are weekly client calls/meetings to ensure I stay close to their immediate and long term needs, as well as continue to build on established relationships. When I’m not working from our corporate headquarters in Costa Mesa, I’m either visiting clients or working from my home office in Los Angeles.  Being a woman in this space, what has been your greatest challenge? Biggest win? In my 25 years in the financial services industry, there have been many times when I’m on the other side of a negotiation with individuals or groups who are predominately male. When I started in my career, I would wear my heart on my sleeve and even throughout my career there have been many times when my passion for something reflected in the form of emotion. I have made a conscious effort to remove emotions from business dialogue. As an individual who is deeply invested in my work life, it has been an evolving process for me to find a way to balance my authentic self, who values personal connections with peers and clients, with an approach that also removes the “personal” from the process to keep the wins and losses objective. One of the deals I am most proud of was an over year-long negotiation with a global credit card issuer to merge their transaction data with the Experian credit data in 2006. The opportunity of blending transaction and credit data was somewhat visionary at the time. I learned a great deal about what it takes to sell a new concept internally and externally.  I had the opportunity to work across many business units at Experian, which was a great platform for getting to know the organization and build my career in its early stages. It also gave me exposure to complex negotiations and confidence in my ability to identify and nurture strategic opportunities between large organizations. What are the most important values you demonstrate as a leader? Compassion, integrity, courage. I feel it is important to avoid making assumptions, come from a place of understanding, and offer kindness, even when situations can feel adversarial. I believe in the power of taking risks, and that most things that we aspire for reside on the other side of our fear. I approach each day with the attitude of doing the most important thing first, even if it is the thing you want to do the least. I believe it is my responsibility to help individuals understand what is possible through adversity, determination and goal setting. Who inspires you?  One of the individuals who inspired me most in my lifetime, was and still is my father. Even though he is no longer alive, he was absolutely a mentor and role model for me personally and professionally. He was a dreamer and someone who took many risks, failed many times, and kept an optimistic attitude, even through a difficult illness.  He had the gift of connecting people, making people laugh and captivating an audience with his humor and story-telling abilities. He started his career as a teacher, and then spent the majority in agricultural sales. He shared with me the reason he valued sales is that there is a direct correlation between your skill and work efforts and your rewards. He shared the importance of continuous personal growth and sharing your knowledge with others. He also demonstrated the value of building long term relationships, and along with that, the importance of doing the right thing, even when there is no direct benefit to you. Favorite authors/books? Elizabeth Gilbert “Big Magic” Tererai Trent “The Awakened Woman” Tali Sharot “The Optimism Bias” Check back to learn more about "Women of Experian" throughout the week.

There are lots of reasons why people miss a bill payment. Unfortunately, the approaches for collecting those late payments tend to follow a one-size-fits-all approach. For example, a customer takes a long vacation and forgets to pay his credit card bill before he leaves. When he gets home ten days later he already has five phone calls and two official notices from the collections department. And the calls continue for the next few days until he has an opportunity to call them back to take care of the situation. How does this customer feel? Frustrated? Annoyed? Under-valued? The current collections process is outdated, especially in a world where personalized and relevant communications are becoming the norm. The collections process is driven by the measurement of delinquency and loss. Rarely does it consider the broader customer profile. Too often, this narrow view leads to one-size-fits all collections strategies and overly aggressive processes. Getting debt collection right is about more than the money. It needs to be about the customer. It’s about knowing the difference between a customer who has simply forgotten to make a payment or someone dealing with financial hardship. We recently released a paper on the collections process, looking at how common it is for overly aggressive collections to lead to account closures and erosion of customer lifetime value. In fact, we found 3 percent of 30-day delinquencies in card portfolios closed their accounts after paying their balance in full. Seventy-five percent of those closures came with the payment to bring the account current and the remaining 25 percent closed the account within the following 60 days. Our analysis also showed that people with the lowest balances and the lowest amount past-due had the highest incidence of paying off their debt and closing their accounts. That means that by being too aggressive over a fairly low dollar amount, you can damage the relationship with a customer who could bring a lifetime of more business. We also used our Mosaic® lifestyle segmentation system to do a deeper look into who was more likely to close their accounts. We found the likelihood to close accounts was four times higher in the young, urban, affluent population than it was with others. This particular segment usually has the greatest potential for lifetime value and are the hardest to attract. It seems counterproductive to let overly aggressive and perhaps unnecessary, debt collection end the relationship. However, if we become smarter about the collections process, it could be possible to not only keep the customer, but also strengthen the relationship. Consider this, the customer on that long vacation receives an email that says, “Hey we noticed you forgot to make your last payment. Can you email us back the reason why and when we should expect it?” This creates an opportunity to build the relationship with that customer and get a commitment to settle the payment by a particular date. Ten days later when he gets back from vacation, he receives a reminder to make the payment and takes care of it.  Instead of feeling frustrated, annoyed or undervalued, the customer has a positive experience and continues doing business with a company who is focused on building relationships vs. simply collecting money. There is a real opportunity to take best practices around customer experience from earlier stages of the customer lifecycle and apply them to the collections stage. Sure, some situations may require a more aggressive approach, for others, the idea of an email and the option to log on to a virtual platform to handle the debt on their own terms is the preferred approach. Some customers may not need options other than a little more time to pay on their own terms.  It comes down to knowing your customer and applying the insights we can uncover from data to handle debt collection. This will allow us to improve the customer experience and strengthen customer life-time value.

As the world celebrates International Women's Day on March 8, we want to shine a light on a few of the female leaders who shape, inspire and grow Experian. From sales to strategy, to people management, big data and beyond, women are a driving force in every industry - and their stories deserve to be told. Throughout the week, meet some of the "Women of Experian." Today, we feature Jennifer Schulz, group president of Experian's Health, Auto and Targeting businesses. Learn about her typical day, sources of motivation and perspectives on leadership and innovation. What do you do at Experian? What’s a typical day like for you?  I’m Group President of Experian’s Health, Auto and Targeting businesses - definitely a diverse industry mix to manage. As such, no two days are alike, and that is one of the things I love most about my job. On some days I meet with clients or partners, and on others I dedicate my time to reviewing the progress of our growth strategies, or focusing on budget and risk topics. I love the variety of industries and topics that are involved in this job. It keeps things interesting. How do you motivate yourself and stay motivated? I stay motivated by remaining connected to my clients and employees. I'm always striving to understand how our products and company have helped the businesses and people we serve. What are some patterns you’ve noticed over the years about women at work, and things they could be doing better to advance their careers? I once had the opportunity to listen to Indra Nooyi, CEO of Pepsi, and she said something that really resonated with me. I'm paraphrasing, but basically she shared that women need to be more direct in their feedback with one another, always pushing each other to do better. Essentially, if you see a female (or male) colleague struggling or doing something that is undermining their impact (e.g. not speaking up in meetings) – reach out and help them. Give them that feedback in the moment so they can be more successful. Where do the great ideas come from in your organization? In all of the Experian's businesses, I’ve found the most consistent source of product ideas come from our clients. Our users provide great enhancement ideas, so we work to consistently capture that "voice of customer" feedback. With that said, I believe we have some of the most innovative employees as well. Every day, I see examples of our people thinking big and pushing ideas forward. What is one characteristic that you believe every leader should possess? Integrity. Check back to learn more about "Women of Experian" throughout the week.

I recently sat down with Kathleen Peters, SVP and Head of Fraud and Identity, to discuss the state of fraud and identity, the pace of change in the space and her recent inclusion in the Top 100 influencers in Identity by One World Identity. ----------- Traci: Congratulations on being included on the Top 100 influencers list. What a nice honor. Kathleen: Yes, thank you. It is a nice honor and inspiring to be included among some great innovators in the industry. The list includes entrepreneurs to leaders of large organizations like us. It’s a nice mix across all facets of identity. T: Tell me about your role. How long have you been at Experian? K: I lead the team that defines the product strategy for our global fraud and ID portfolio. I’ve been with Experian just over four years, joining soon after we acquired 41st Parameter®. T: What was your first job? K: My first job out of college was with Motorola in Chicago. I was an electrical engineer, working on advanced cellphone technology. T: They were not able to keep up with the market? K: The entire industry was caught by the introduction of the iPhone. All the major cellphone companies were impacted — Nokia, Ericsson, Siemens and others. Talk about disrupting an industry. T: Yeah. These are great examples of how the disrupters have taken out the initial companies. Certainly, Motorola, Nokia, those companies. Even RIM Blackberry, which redefined the digital or cellular space, has all but disappeared. K: Yes, exactly. It was interesting to watch RIM Blackberry when they disrupted Motorola’s pager business. Motorola had a very robust pager line. Even then they had a two-way pager with a keyboard. They just missed the idea of mobile email completely. It’s really, really fascinating to look back now. T: Changing the subject a little, what motivates you to get out of bed in the morning? K: One of my favorite questions. I’m a very purpose-driven person. One of the things I really like about my role and one of the reasons I came to Experian in the first place is that I could see this huge potential within the company to combine offline and online identity information and transaction information to better recognize people and stop fraud. T: What do you see as the biggest threat to organizations today? K: I would have to say the pace of change. As we were just talking about, major industries can be disrupted seemingly overnight. We’re in the midst of a real digital transformation in how we live, how we work, how we share information and even how we share money. The threat to companies is twofold. One is the “friendly fire” threat, like the pace of change, disrupters to the market, new ways of doing things and keeping pace with that innovation. The second threat is that with digitization comes new types of security and fraud risks. Today, organizations need to be ever-vigilant about their security. T: How do you stay ahead of that pace of change? K: Well, my husband and I have lived in Silicon Valley since 1997. Technology and innovation are all around us. We read about it and we hear about it in the news. We engage with our neighbors and other people who we meet socially and within our networks. You can’t help but be immersed in it all the time. It certainly influences the way we go about our lives and how we think and act and engage as a family. We’re all technically curious. We have two kids, and our neighborhood high school, Homestead High, is the same high school Steve Jobs went to. It’s fun that way. T: Definitely. What are some of the most effective ways for businesses to combat the threat of fraud? K: I firmly believe that nowadays it all needs to start with identity. What we’ve found — and confirmed through research in our recent Global Fraud Report, plus conversations I’ve had with clients and analysts — is that if you can better recognize someone, you’ll go a long way to prevent fraud. And it does more than prevent fraud; it provides a better experience for the people you’re engaged with. Because once you recognize an individual, that initiates a trusted relationship between the two of you. Once people feel they’re in a trusted relationship, whether it’s a social relationship or a financial transaction, whatever the relationship is — once you feel trusted, you feel safe, you feel protected. And you’re more likely to want to engage again in the future. I believe the best thing organizations can do is take a multilayered approach to authenticating and identifying people upfront. There are so many ways to do this digitally without disrupting the consumer, and this is the best opportunity for businesses. If we collectively get that right, we’ll stop fraud. T: What are some of the things Experian is focusing on to help businesses stop fraud? K: We’ve focused on our CrossCore® platform. CrossCore is a common access and decisioning capability platform that allows the combining and layering of many different approaches — some active, some passive — to identify a customer in a transaction. You can incorporate things like biometrics and behavioral attributes. You can incorporate digital information about the device you’re engaging with. You can layer in online and offline identity information, like that from our Precise ID® product. CrossCore also enables you to layer in other digital attributes and alternative data such as email address, phone number and the validity of that phone number. CrossCore provides a great opportunity for us to showcase innovation, whether that comes from a third-party partner or even from our own Experian DataLabs. T: How significant do you see machine learning moving forward? K: Machine learning, it has all kinds of names, right? I think of machine learning, artificial intelligence, data robotics, parallel computing — all these things are related to what we used to call big data processing, but that’s not really the trendy term anymore. The point is that there is so much data today. There’s a wealth of data from all different sources, and as a society we’re producing it in exponential volumes. Having more and more and more data is not useful if you can’t derive insights from it. That’s why machine learning, augmented with human intervention or direction, is the best way forward, because there’s so much data out there available in the world now. No matter what problem we’re trying to solve, there’s a wealth of data we can amass, but we need to make sense of it. And the way to make sense of massive amounts of data in a reasonable amount of time is by using some sort of artificial intelligence, or machine learning. We’re going to see it in all kinds of applications. We already are today. So, while I think of machine learning as a generic term, I do think it’s going to be with us for a while to quickly compute and derive meaningful insights from the massive amounts of data all around us. T: Thanks, okay. Last question, and I hope a little fun. How would you describe yourself in one word? K: Curious. T: Ah, that’s a good choice. K: I am always curious. That’s why I love living where I live. It’s why I like working in technology. I’ve always wondered how things work, how we might improve on them, what’s under the hood. Why people make the decisions they do. How does someone come up with this? I’m always curious. T: Well, thank you for the time, and congrats again on being included in the Top 100 influencers in Identity.  

As the world celebrates International Women's Day on March 8, we want to shine a light on a few of the female leaders who shape, inspire and grow Experian. From sales to strategy, to people management, big data and beyond, women are a driving force in every industry - and their stories deserve to be told. Throughout the week, meet some of the "Women of Experian." Today, we feature Shannon Lois, a leader of our business and the senior vice president who meets with Experian internal and external clients of all sizes to understand their challenges around data, technology, risk and running a business. Read about her career journey, learnings and sources of inspiration as it pertains to leadership. What do you do at Experian?  What’s a typical day like for you? I lead the consulting organization across Experian. We focus on bringing the value of industry and client expertise to the market and to our existing and prospective clients. We bring the business acumen to deliver all Experian solutions. I also lead go-to-market activities for Decision Analytics, creating market driven propositions and messaging for our internal and external clients. On a typical day, I am working with colleagues, business partners and clients, leading discussions across the Experian network to define and refine client solutions. That means lots of conversations about who we are, what we do and the value that consultants and Experian can bring to clients’ businesses. How do you motivate yourself and stay motivated? I have been motivated since I was a child in school by seeing a project or activity progress from its early stages to a successful completion. I’m a strong believer that hard work (personal or professional) pays off. I am driven by the satisfaction of everything from creating a delicious meal to a successful client delivery and seeing them use my team’s ideas to make their business better. I also enjoy watching my hand-selected team, who works just as hard as I do, create, develop and positively impact our clients, often with something that has never been done before. What are some patterns you’ve noticed over the years about women at work, and things they could be doing better to advance their careers? Women are steadily becoming more confident in their ability to manage their own success. While there have always been fewer women in the analytics and decisioning space, they are growing steadily stronger in assessing the value they contribute to their day-to-day work. The difference is evident as they bring new ideas and create unique, efficient ways of solving for client business problems. They are also asking for more opportunities, and the rewards that come with excelling and delivering on those initiatives. Confidence is key! There are many words of advice that I could offer (and that I constantly remind myself of), but the one that resonates the most is to understand the value you bring to each specific situation (day-to-day work, special project, new position) and don’t be afraid to own your success. What is one characteristic that you believe every leader should possess? I think being humble is critical. Everyone in the organization contributes in some way to the whole, and I have found that I can learn from them all. If you’re approachable and treat everyone with the dignity and respect they deserve, regardless of their position, it’s a huge benefit because people open up to you. Every day, I am challenged by others to think differently, strategically and tactically, and that helps me to be a better leader. What are your hobbies outside of work? I’m Italian and cooking is my passion! I have fond memories of helping my mother prepare fresh, authentic Italian food and gathering together for family meals. These are traditions I still carry on with my own family, and I love preparing traditional dishes like Roman gnocchi and homemade pasta. Check back to learn more about "Women of Experian" throughout the week.

The average number of retail trades per consumer has been trending down since 2007. But the average consumer retail debt is trending up, roughly $73 year-over-year. When analyzing single-store credit card debt by state in 2017, we found: States with the highest retail debt: Texas ($2,198) Alaska ($2,170) Arkansas ($2,067) States with the lowest amount of retail debt: Wisconsin ($1,374) Minnesota ($1,440) Hawaii ($1,442) Whether you’re a retailer, credit union or financial institution, stay ahead of the competition by using advanced analytics to target the right customers and increase profitability. More credit trends

“Who Moved My Cheese?” Perhaps you've heard of this popular book, released in 1998. If you haven't, it's a quick read and one that describes four fictional characters - two mice and two "little people" - on their quest to hunt for cheese. On their journey, they have to assess their routines and consider change - that word that makes so many of us uncomfortable. I bring this up because it is no secret that the consumer has changed dramatically over the years. Technology, the need for personalization, the demand for speed. Yes, the consumer has changed for sure, and everyone seems to recognize this but collections professionals. Look at any financial institution and you will hear and see leaders talking about and executing on digital acquisition and account management strategies. After all, digital is the medium that consumers desire when interacting with their financial service providers. Marketers know this and most have adapted, but when it comes to collections, the industry seems to be fixated on utilizing the tactics of the past. Today, collectors largely rely on calling consumers and sending out dunning letters. Right Party Contact rates continue to decline, and with 50 percent of consumers lacking land lines, the contact rates are only going to get worse. I say all this because if you want to see success, you must change. Offering your past-due customers a digital experience will not only increase your collections performance and recoveries, but simultaneously improve your customer experience and reduce costs. This is a huge opportunity if collectors would just embrace a digital collections strategy. And let me note that having a payment portal is not a digital collections strategy. If that was the case, digital marketers would be done with just a simple website, and then they can wish their consumers will land on the site. A digital collections experience is much more. Why stay stuck in the past?  Change is good, let someone else look for that old cheese.

Traditional credit attributes provide immense value for lenders when making decisions, but when used alone, they are limited to capturing credit behavior during a single moment of time. To add a deeper layer of insight, Experian® today unveiled new trended attributes, aimed at giving lenders a wider view into consumer credit behavior and patterns over time. Ultimately, this helps them expand into new risk segments and better tailor credit offers to meet consumer needs. An Experian analysis shows that custom models developed using Trended 3DTM attributes provide up to a 7 percent lift in predictive performance when compared with models developed using traditional attributes only. “While trended data has been shown to provide additional insight into a consumer’s credit behavior, lack of standardization across different providers has made it a challenge to gain those insights,” said Steve Platt, Experian’s Group President of Decision Analytics and Data Quality. “Trended 3D makes it easy for our clients to get value from trended data in a consistent manner, so they can make more informed decisions across the credit life cycle and, more importantly, give consumers better access to lending options.” Experian’s Trended 3D attributes help lenders unlock valuable insights hidden within credit reports. For example, two people may have similar balances, utilization and risk scores, but their paths to that point may be substantially different. The solution synthesizes a 24-month history of five key credit report fields — balance, credit limit or original loan amount, scheduled payment amount, actual payment amount and last payment date. Lenders can gain insight into: Changes in balances over time Migration patterns from one tradeline or multiple tradelines to another Variations in utilization and credit limits Changes in payment activity and collections Balance transfer and debt consolidation behavior Behavior patterns of revolving trades versus transactional trades Additionally, Trended 3D leverages machine learning techniques to evaluate behavioral data and recognize patterns that previously may have gone undetected. To learn more information about Experian’s Trended 3D attributes, click here.

Many data furnishers are experiencing increases in dispute rates. It’s a tough spot to be in. Data furnishers are not only obligated under the FCRA to investigate and respond to all consumer disputes – reviewing every Automated Consumer Dispute Verification – but they must also do so within less than 30 days. As the number of disputes rise, resources become taxed and the risk of not meeting Fair Credit Reporting Act (FCRA) obligations increases. Let’s face it, consumer disputes aren’t going away, but understanding the reported data and metrics behind disputes can help data furnishers minimize them and defend reporting strategies and processes. 5 Way to Uncover Data Inaccuracy 1. Gain perspective against the industry and peers. Depending on the industry you service, the general benchmarks for dispute rates can vary. It’s important to understand where you fall in regards to dispute rates. Are you trending high or low? As an annualized average, we’ve recently experienced the following industry dispute rates through the end of the year: However, industry averages are just the tip of the iceberg. Measurement against peers can provide a clearer picture of where you fall. Are you an outlier or on par? How do you respond in comparison to peers? Are you deleting the trade as the result of the dispute at a higher rate? This could be an indicator of a systemic problem that needs addressing. 2. Implement pre-submission quality checks. Once you know where you stand, make sure your data is accurate before it heads out the door and hits the consumer’s credit report. Implement manual checks against Metro 2 rules. Build SQL queries to perform your checks. Better yet, use data validation software to automatically identify, track and remediate errors before sending the file to the bureaus. These steps can catch disputes before they happen. 3. Review any data being rejected after submission. Even if your new reporting motto is ‘know before it goes’; once the data has been transmitted, you’ll still want to monitor data being rejected due to Metro 2® errors. When data is rejected that means the update you provided did not make it to file. This leaves room for disputes. Incorporating a robust review of all rejected data in a timely and detailed manner, with updates made before the next reporting period, can improve the accuracy of your data. 4. Audit to identify and correct any stale data on file. An audit for any stale data  - which includes open accounts with a balance greater than zero that have not been updated recently - should be performed at least annually. Review, research and remediate any outdated data that could affect your customer, making it susceptible to a dispute. 5. Educate your customers. Why are your customers disputing? Are there common themes within your customer base? Often, a dispute can be eliminated before it happens, with some explanation on the way an account is reported. By providing proactive access to materials and resources that help demystify the credit reporting process, a potentially negative interaction can be turned into a positive learning opportunity, helping the overall customer experience. Learn more about data accuracy solutions.

Credit card balances grew to $786.6 billion at the end of 2017, a 6.7% increase to the previous year and the largest outstanding balance in over a decade. And while the delinquency rate increased slightly to 2.26%, it is significantly lower than the 4.73% delinquency rate in 2008 when outstanding balances were $737 billion. The increase in credit card balances combined with the slight growth in delinquencies points to a positive credit environment. Stay up to date on the latest credit trends to maximize your lending strategies and capitalize on areas of opportunity. Get more credit trends and insights at our webinar on March 8. Register here

Expert offers insights into turnkey big data access   The data is out there – and there is a lot of it. In the world of credit, there are more than 220 million credit-active consumers. Bolt on insights from the alternative financial services space and that number climbs even higher. So, what can analysts do with this information? With technology and the rise of data scientists, there are certainly opportunities to dig in and explore. To learn more, we chatted with Chris Fricks, data and product expert, responsible for Experian’s Analytical Sandbox™. 1. With the launch of Experian’s all-new Ascend platform, one of the key benefits is full-file access to our Sandbox environment. What exactly can clients access and are there specific tools they need to dig into the data? Clients will have access to monthly snapshots of 12-plus years of the full suite of Experian scores, attributes, and raw credit data covering the full national consumer base. Along with the data access, clients can interact and manipulate the data with the analytic tools they prefer. For example, a client can log into the environment through a standard Citrix portal and land on a Windows desktop. From there, they can access applications like SAS, R, Python, or Tableau to interrogate the data assets and derive the necessary value. 2. How are clients benefiting from this access? What are the top use cases you are seeing? Clients are now able to speed analytic findings to market and iterate through the analytics lifecycle much faster. We are seeing clients are engaging in new model development, reject inferencing, and industry/peer benchmarking. One of the more advanced use cases is related to machine learning – think of artificial intelligence for data analytics. In this instance, we have tools like H2O, a robust source of data for users to draw on, and a platform that is optimized to bring it all together in a cohesive, easy-to-use manner. 3. Our Experian database has details on 220 million credit-active consumers. Is this data anonymized, and how are we ensuring sensitive details are secure? We use the data from our credit database, but we’ve assigned unique consumer-level and trade-level encrypted pins to ensure security.  Once the encrypted PINs are assigned, they remain the same over time. Then all PII is scrubbed and everything is rendered de-identifiable from an individual consumer and lender perspective. Our pinning technique allows users to accurately track individual trades and consumers through time, but also prevents any match back to individual consumers and lenders. 4. I imagine having access to so much data could be overwhelming for clients. Is more necessarily better? You’re right. Access to our full credit file can be a lot to handle. While general users will not “actively” use the full file daily, statisticians and data scientists will see an advantage to having access to the larger universe. For example, if a statistician only has access to 10% of the Sandbox and wants to look at a specific region of the country, they may find their self in a situation with limited data that it is no longer statistically significant. By accessing the full file, they can sample down based on the full population from the region they are concerned with analyzing. 5. Who are the best-suited individuals to dig into the Sandbox environment and assess trends and findings? The environment is designed to serve the front-line analysts responsible for coding and analytics that gets reported out to various levels of leadership. It also enables the socialization of those findings with leadership, helping them to interact and give feedback on what they are seeing. Learn more about Experian’s Analytical Sandbox and request a demo.

Today’s consumer lending environment is more dynamic and competitive than ever, with renewed focus on personal loans, marketplace lending and the ever-challenging credit card market. One of the significant learnings from the economic crisis is how digging deeper into consumer credit data can help provide insights into trending behavior and not just point-in-time credit evaluation. For example, I’ve found consumer trending behavior to be very powerful when evaluating risks of credit card revolvers versus transactors. However, trended data can come with its own challenges when the data isn’t interpreted uniformly across multiple data sources. To address these challenges, Experian® has developed trended attributes, which can provide significant lift in the development of segmentation strategies and custom models. These Trended 3DTM attributes are used effectively across the life cycle to drive balance transfers, mitigate high-risk exposure and fine-tune strategies for customers near score cutoffs. One of the things I look for when exploring new trended data is the ability to further understand payment velocity. These characteristics go far beyond revolver and transactor flags, and into the details of consumer usage and trajectory. As illustrated in the chart, a consumer isn’t easily classified into one borrowing persona (revolver, transactor, etc.) or another — it’s a spectrum of use trends. Experian’s Trended 3D provides details needed to understand payment rates, slope of balance growth and even trends in delinquency. These trends provide strong lift across all decisioning strategies to improve your business performance. In recent engagements with lenders, new segmentation tools and data for the development of custom models is at the forefront of the conversation. Risk managers are looking for help leveraging new modeling techniques such as machine learning, but often have challenges moving from prior practices. In addition, attribute governance has been a key area of focus that is addressed with Trended 3D, as it was developed using machine learning techniques and is delivered with the necessary documentation for regulatory conformance. This provides an impressive foundation, allowing you to integrate the most advanced analytics into your credit decisioning. Alternative data isn’t the only source for new consumer insights. Looking at the traditional credit report can still provide so much insight; we simply need to take advantage of new techniques in analytics development. Trended attributes provide a high-definition lens that opens a world of opportunity.

 Organizations that can mobilize their data assets to power critical business initiatives will see a distinct advantage in the coming years. In fact, most C-level executives (87%) believe data has greatly disrupted their organization’s operations over the past 12 months. Here are more insights from the newly released 2018 global data management benchmark report: As digital transformation efforts proliferate and become commonplace, organizations will need to implement processes and technology that scale with the demands of data-driven business. Read the full report

It’s clear the digital marketplace is here to stay. Online activities among consumers reflect the increased adoption of digital commerce. In fact, recent findings from our 2018 Global Fraud and Identity Report show the top activity on mobile devices is online shopping, followed closely by personal banking.   Consumers trust technology and, by proxy, the businesses that help enable it. It’s critical for organizations to continue to build trust online without disrupting the consumer experience. It’s the goal — and the responsibility — of businesses. Learn more