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Experian hosting Future of Fraud and Identity event during National Cyber Security Awareness Month Costa Mesa, Calif., Oct. 13, 2014 — Identity and fraud concerns are a pressing global issue for many industries, including financial services, public sector and retailers. With the rise in security and data breaches, many organizations across the United States are particularly challenged, due to the growth of malware viruses, mobile-payment advancements and the need to authenticate online and mobile consumers better. To help business leaders address these rising fraud and identity issues, Experian® is hosting the Future of Fraud and Identity event on Oct. 21 in New York City, N.Y. The event will feature: Ori Eisen, Experian fraud expert and founder of 41st Parameter, highlighting the current trends in cybersecurity and how technology can combat these major threats Frank Abagnale, of Catch Me If You Can fame and respected authority on financial crime and fraud, sharing his personal story highlighting his work with numerous financial institutions over the past 38 years Charles Chung, president of Experian Decision Analytics, a global leader in fraud and identity products, opening the event Jon Jones, senior vice president of fraud and identity for Experian Decision Analytics, presenting Experian’s strategic view on identity risk management Many organizations are trying to address fraud risks while adapting to the changing habits of customers. One example of this is the acceptance of new mobile-payment options that are driving a transformation of the payments ecosystem. Current mobile-fraud trends include the use of increasingly sophisticated malware as attackers capitalize on banks and retailers providing these new service offerings to consumers via mobile devices. “Gaining control in this dynamic fraud environment is a major challenge for businesses as the Internet and mobile technologies were not designed with fraud in mind. Consumers accessing their financial or personal data at any time is a key fraud risk today, further enabling criminal activity,” said Eisen. “As companies invest to meet customer expectations and ensure that payments are secure and reliable, we see an urgent need for proactive next-generation security measures with fraud detection and intelligent device identification for corporate accounts and online transactions.” In 2013, identity theft affected more than 13 million U.S. consumers and accounted for more than $18 billion in losses. As technologies evolve and information security tightens, the savvy nature of fraudsters becomes more sophisticated. As a result, fraud management needs to evolve and include both offline and online fraud strategies to provide a panoramic view of the customer. In order to achieve this, authentication processes need to become seamless and straightforward to allow both the consumer and the business to feel confident in the authentication process while creating a positive customer experience. “Serious risks are emerging for consumers and businesses as fraudsters identify new targets to attack. The monetary cost of fraud losses can be high, but the impact a loss or breach can have on customer relationships and brand integrity can be even higher,” said Chung. “Combining comprehensive authentication processes with proportionate measures to monitor user activities and protect consumer data throughout the life cycle is a competitive requirement in today’s market.” The Future of Fraud and Identity event will take place on Oct. 21 in New York City, from 7:30 a.m. to noon at the Helen Mills Event Space at 137 West 26th Street.

Experian Consumer Services in association with Univision Communications Inc., the leading media company serving Hispanic America, recently launched a Spanish-language, credit-focused product and online financial resource center for the U.S. Hispanic community called Crédito y Más. The new product was developed to improve Hispanics access to credit education and resources. With Crédito y Más, consumers can check their credit score, receive a credit report, and have credit monitoring, among other benefits and access the information in Spanish or English. One of the most valuable features is the Centro de Información™, a robust resource center with articles, videos, financial calculators, a glossary of key credit terms and more.

How can I improve my credit score? That’s a question thousands of consumers ask Experian every day. This question is asked even more frequently now that lenders are sending an estimated 120 million credit-score disclosures each year to consumers when they are denied credit or are offered terms that are less favorable than those offered to others. These score disclosures provide consumers with basic information about the score used in a transaction and direct them to the national credit bureaus if they have any questions. However, when consumers ask Experian how they can improve their credit standing, it’s difficult to respond in an easy and consumer-friendly way. The difficulty arises because, although we want to help, the Credit Repair Organizations Act (CROA) puts substantial roadblocks between credit bureaus and consumers.

Just a little over a week ago, I was in New Orleans surrounded by interesting, engaging and financially-savvy people with a common interest. All of these people were brought together for FinCon Expo, which took place from September 18-21. It was not only a tremendous financial media community networking event, it was an opportunity to learn, grow and find inspiration. From the Experian perspective, it was an opportunity to further build and focus on our social channels as a way to reach consumers and provide education and dialog around credit and financial empowerment. The two-day conference featured an expo hall where one could score some great information (along with some cool swag), keynote sessions that were led by powerful speakers like Jeff Goins, Farnoosh Torabi and Chris Ducker, and a full daily schedule packed with educational sessions and panel discussions (and of course, a lot of beignets served along the way).

The power of data is good. Couple it with analytics and it becomes great. Derive real and tangible insight from this process, and you are left with a very potent tool to affect real change and do a lot of good in the process. At Experian, we have deep experience harnessing the power of data, in fact, we have been doing it since 1897. Using our insights to help merchants and consumers by providing an annual credit reference directory, we were using “big data” before big data was a buzz word.

October is National Cyber Security Awareness Month, and Experian’s ProtectMyID® issued its new survey results about cybersecurity. The study, conducted by Edelman Berland, reveals areas where consumers’ identities are the most at risk, including electronic devices and online accounts. The findings show that 93 percent of respondents believe that identity theft is a growing problem yet are not doing enough to address the issue.

Experian–Oliver Wyman data reports $120 billion in new home-equity credit loans in past year; Q2 2014 saw new mortgage originations totaling $292 billion Costa Mesa, Calif., Sept. 29, 2014 — Mortgage origination volumes saw an increase of 15 percent in Q2 2014. Home-equity line of credit (HELOC) lending saw the biggest gains, according to Experian, the leading global information services company, as reported in its quarterly Experian–Oliver Wyman Market Intelligence report. Is the home refinancing boom over? “Home lending had an incredible two-year period from Q2 2011 to Q2 2013, with $4 trillion in mortgage origination volume; 71 percent of that, or $2.9 trillion, came from home refinancing,” said Linda Haran, senior director of product management and strategy for Experian Decision Analytics. “A look behind those numbers tells us that the total dollars originated over the past four quarters are about $1.3 trillion versus $1.8 trillion, showing a 30 percent decrease in annual origination volumes from the refinancing boom.” “However, those last four quarters show us that the mix of purchase-to-refinance volume has shifted to a fifty-fifty split between refinance and purchase volume activity. This equates to new purchase activity increasing by 22 percent in Q2 2014 from last year, signaling that consumers are getting back into the market. In the long term, this appears to set up the market for continued purchases into spring and summer of 2015.” $35 billion in new HELOC lending from Q2 2014 Home-equity lending increased 25 percent in Q2 2014 totaling $35 billion in new HELOC originations compared with Q2 2013. Looking at the past 12 months, HELOCs totaled $120 billion in new originations, representing a 27 percent increase compared with the previous 12 months. HELOC lending growth seen across all regions Double digit growth was seen in all regions compared to the numbers reported one year ago.  The two regions that led the trend in increasing HELOC origination volumes were the West Coast and the Northeast — with 27 percent and 15 percent year-over-year growth, respectively. California accounted for the highest volume of HELOC dollars originated in Q2 with $5.9 billion, followed by New York with $2.2 billion and Pennsylvania with $2.0 billion. Make sure to join us for the Q3 2014 Experian–Oliver Wyman Market Intelligence Report webinar. About the data The data for this insight and analysis was provided by Experian’s IntelliViewSM product. IntelliView data is sourced from the information that supports the Experian–Oliver Wyman Market Intelligence Reports and is accessed easily through an intuitive, online graphical user interface, which enables financial professionals to extract key findings from the data and integrate them into their business strategies. This unique data asset does this by delivering market intelligence on consumer credit behavior within specific lending categories and geographic regions.

Experian Marketing Services, a recognized leader in data-driven marketing, today unveiled OmniView™, a persistent data-linkage technology that creates a real-time single customer view, as part of the Experian Marketing Suite. The single customer view, or persistent identity, created by OmniView allows organizations to increase the precision, authenticity and sophistication of their marketing campaigns across channels and devices. Since introducing the industry’s first linkage-technology product, Experian Marketing Services has been the go-to resource for identity-linkage issues among database and customer relationship management (CRM) marketers. With the launch of OmniView, Experian Marketing Services extends its market-leading linkage expertise beyond database and CRM marketers to the digital-advertising industry. OmniView resolves pivotal issues plaguing advertising effectiveness, including data quality, accuracy, authenticity and precision. OmniView creates a persistent identity that gives key players within the digital advertising ecosystem — including advertisers, publishers, digital analytics providers and data management platforms — the ability to verify, match and manage identities efficiently in a privacy-protected way from all data sources. “The advertising industry needs a common denominator — a ubiquitous, consistent and persistent link across all channels — to execute legitimate 1-to-1 marketing, and OmniView is that common denominator,” said Rick Erwin, president, consumer insights and targeting, Experian Marketing Services. “OmniView breaks new ground in identity linkage technology in that it gives advertisers the ability to verify, understand and engage with their customers at a scale and accuracy that is unprecedented. This has been the centerpiece of Experian Marketing Services’ strategy for more than 20 years.” A single customer view for addressable advertising According to recent research from Experian, 99 percent of companies believe that achieving a single customer view is important to their business, but only 24 percent say they have a single customer view today. For solutions where media is being activated in addressable advertising, OmniView is the linkage engine that connects an advertiser’s or marketer’s CRM data to Experian’s data, as well as media channels, in a secure, privacy-compliant manner. OmniView gives advertisers a single customer view by establishing identification keys for consumers at an individual, household and address level that serve as a common denominator between all data sources. OmniView is built to process and reconcile large amounts of fragmented data from both third- and first-party sources, including social, email, mobile and transactional data. OmniView features a real-time application programming interface that allows marketers to understand the behavior of their customers as they move in and out of channels and make “in the moment” marketing decisions. A high-speed, high-scale platform, OmniView delivers results in real-time or batch processing. For example, marketers can connect a social-media follower to a display-advertising campaign and know if that follower made a purchase in a brick-and-mortar store. A central element of the Experian Marketing Suite’s Identity Manager, OmniView stands out from other linkage technology products in market through its accuracy. It leverages the most accurate data and the most accurate linkage technology in market. Experian Marketing Services' linkage capabilities excel in reliability and accuracy, with accuracy rates of two times, three times and five times greater than other major vendors. This accuracy ensures meaningful experiences for the consumer that fosters loyalty and repeat purchases to the brand. Learn more about OmniView: http://ex.pn/1mEn5qO

The following article is a guest post from Dara Duguay, executive director, Credit Builders Alliance. A good credit history is crucial in today’s economy. Far more than just a number, a good credit score can make the difference in being able to access the affordable lending products necessary to go to college, buy a home, or start and grow a small business. Renting an apartment, paying for car insurance, signing up for utilities and even landing a job can also be affected by a person’s credit history – or the absence of one.