Number Lock
The Challenge: Brand Impersonation
As robotexting and other types of communications fraud continue to frustrate telecom carriers, business enterprises, and consumers, new solutions are needed to combat these increasingly sophisticated and costly scams. One of the most nefarious organized scams involves brand impersonation through text messaging – a malicious activity that can result in significant losses for businesses and consumers.
In this scenario, fraudsters may hijack recognized phone numbers of brands and financial institutions and use them to communicate with end-user victims to extort them via text messaging. In this scheme, fraudsters might target phone numbers trusted by a customer base, such as call center numbers or emergency numbers used to report a stolen credit card. The unsuspecting victims believe they are engaging with real brand representatives and are persuaded to divulge account passwords and sensitive information, make purchases or transfer money.
The netnumber Solution
Number Lock helps fight text messaging fraud by enabling business enterprises in the United States to restrict text enablement on specified 10-digit non-mobile phone numbers upon the request of the subscriber to the number (for example, the emergency phone number of a bank where customers call to block a stolen credit card).
Doing so helps safeguard the enterprises and their users against brand impersonation, where fraudsters may use well-known business phone numbers to obtain the trust of their victims via text messaging and then use that trust to engage consumers in damaging, costly activities.
In addition, Number Lock supports Do Not Originate (DNO) requirements, which are growing in use in the industry and are increasingly the subject of regulatory demands. Number Lock provides a powerful mechanism for enterprises to declare and shield DNO numbers – numbers that are not legitimate sender IDs for text messaging – within the messaging ecosystem. This serves as another important fraud aversion mechanism.
Phone numbers that are protected with Number Lock are also continuously monitored using netnumber’s Number Watch service.
netnumber GDS provides a wide array of fraud prevention tools (see the Trust Pillar section of our product portfolio under our Services). With Number Lock, we add one more tool to benefit enterprises directly and help them stay protected against advanced fraud techniques.
Number Lock is a much-needed service offered via the netnumber Services Registry (nnSR®), an industry registry launched in 2008 and managed by netnumber GDS. The nnSR® is a critical piece of the U.S. message routing infrastructure. As the authoritative messaging routing registry in the U.S., it contains dedicated service details for individual phone numbers, essential for enabling messaging services.
Key Features
Ability to Restrict Text Enablement of 10-digit Non-Mobile Numbers
Enterprise customers can designate their non-mobile numbers for strict no-texting status, making them virtually impossible to text-enable.
Real-Time Reporting of Fraud Attempts
Customers will receive regular reports on text-enablement requests for their numbers via a dedicated Number Watch API.
Added Support for Do Not Originate Requirements
Provides a powerful mechanism for enterprises to inform the industry of their non-mobile numbers which are not text-enabled. DNO capabilities are increasingly being mandated by regulators.
Use Cases
Helps to avert brand impersonation via U.S. text messaging: Enterprises own certain phone numbers that are well known to their customer base, such as the call center number or a phone number to call in case of emergency (e.g., stolen credit card).
Fraudsters may try to take control of such phone numbers and initiate text messages from them in an attempt to gain the trust of their targets. Consumers receiving communication from seemingly trustworthy numbers might be more inclined to share confidential information like account passwords and PINs, or to perform financial transactions to the benefit of the fraudsters. With Number Lock, text enablement of enterprise specified non-mobile numbers is averted and therefore fraudsters are deterred from exploiting this fraud method.
Benefits
- Helps to deter brand impersonation
- Helps protect U.S. enterprises and their customers against fraud via text messaging
- Informs the enterprise of unauthorized text-enablement attempts and other activity on the protected numbers
CONTACT US TODAY!
To learn more about Number Lock and how netnumber ’ full range of innovative, pioneering and cost-effective phone number intelligence solutions can help you streamline, simplify and secure your network operations, drop us a line at sales@netnumber.com
