There’s no doubt that all this staying home is boring, so it’s no wonder people have picked up new hobbies since the start of the pandemic. Some folks have taken to puzzles or Sudoku, while others prefer to binge watch every season of Ozark. Criminals were not immune either, picking up new skills and accelerating their attacks.

Criminal activity spiked over the COVID-19 timeline. Staying home has created new vulnerabilities as most of our commerce and financial lives have gone online. The result has been a dramatic uptick in fraud, with most fraudulent activity being email-based phishing attacks as well as attempts to take over accounts and create accounts with synthetic data.

To further discuss fraud in the marketplace and how financial technology experts like Refinitiv and newly acquired GIACT are combatting the recent influx in fraud activity, PaymentsJournal sat down with Melissa Townsley-Solis, Head of GIACT, James Mirfin, Head of Digital Identity and Financial Crime at Refinitiv, and Tim Sloane, VP, Payments Innovation at Mercator Advisory Group.

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What is Refinitiv?

Refinitiv was founded in 2018 and is a global provider of financial market data. It serves more than 40,000 institutions in nearly 190 countries and provides information, technology, and insights that look to revolutionize the global financial markets.

“The risk business, which I sit within and the GIACT business is now coming into, is a business that has been very focused on helping customers fight financial crime, particularly around risk intelligence data, individuals and entities that prevent heightened regulatory risk, and due diligence,” remarked Mirfin. And over the last year or so, Refinitiv has moved into areas like digital identity and expanding out its offerings.

“It’s a risk business focused on financial crime prevention,” added Mirfin. Refinitiv plans to use GIACT’s fraud detection services to enhance its capabilities and help customers deal with threats of fraud.

Fraud in the marketplace

Over the past few years, FIs and other money management companies have been looking to take a more integrated a...