Illuma Secures Funding for Voice Security Tech in Credit Unions

Digital identity wallets have moved from fringe pilots into core infrastructure—delivering a verified, deterministic input to existing business identity stacks. Organizations that integrate them early will resolve identity faster, slash fraud, and stay ahead of tightening compliance mandates. https://lnkd.in/ex9pBWQN

Account takeover fraud is slipping past the login screen, and stolen credentials that work exactly as designed are the reason why. A new analysis from ZIGRAM, summarized by @FinTech Global, finds that attackers increasingly use genuine stolen credentials to mimic legitimate account activity rather than obviously fake logins. The FBI's Internet Crime Complaint Center logged more than 5,100 account takeover complaints since January 2025, with losses exceeding $262 million. Separately, Federal Reserve Financial Services cites industry research putting U.S. ATO losses at $15.6 billion in 2024, up from $12.7 billion the year before, and the Fed's 2026 Risk Officer Report found 23% of financial institutions experienced takeover activity, up seven points year over year. Since a correctly entered password can't tell a bank whether the right person is typing it, ZIGRAM's analysis calls for stitching together device signals, behavioral changes, contact-detail updates, and new beneficiaries into one continuous picture rather than treating each as a separate checkpoint. More on this story here 👉: https://lnkd.in/eKPSN6re #AccountTakeover #FraudPrevention #Authentication #Payments #Fintech

A document can be real. A phone number can be real. A device can be real. Put them together, and the person behind them still might not be. That’s the blind spot in identity verification today, not that any single check is wrong, but that each one only sees its own slice. A sophisticated attack combines synthetic personal information, a manipulated document, a deepfake, and a compromised device, then slips through wherever those checks don’t talk to each other. We started closing that gap 12 years ago, one connected signal at a time. Last week, we shared what that’s built: 6,000+ customers including : the top 5 U.S. banks, 4 of the Mag 7, the largest HR, payroll, and workforce providers, 4 of the 5 largest U.S. crypto exchanges, and the largest sportsbook and prediction market operators, a $5.2B valuation, and six product launches on that same foundation. Here’s how we’re addressing the gap from both sides. DocV Omega asks whether the whole picture agrees: document, biometric, phone, device, network, velocity, and geolocation, read together instead of in sequence. That combination is what improves detection of synthetic document fraud, injection attacks, and deepfakes. Result: 98% fraud capture in the riskiest 5% of transactions, 99% true accept rate, under a second. Country-aware Phone and Email RiskScore solve the reverse problem, when companies are faced with almost no identity data to work with extending that same connected approach across borders. For one LATAM remittance customer: 78% of phone fraud caught in the riskiest 5%. Digital wallets are changing how people prove who they are, and regulators are catching up. In September, FinCEN, the Federal Reserve Board, FDIC, OCC, and NCUA confirmed a government-issued verifiable digital credential can satisfy CIP requirements. We added mobile driver’s license verification to DocV, cryptographically verifying eligible Google Wallet and Samsung Wallet credentials against issuing authorities. Login.gov began accepting eligible mDLs in August; we’re supporting that rollout with Xcelerate Solutions under a five-year, $163M GSA call order. Reusable digital credentials won’t remove the need for fraud controls. But they start to remove the need to prove who you are from scratch, every time. Read the full story from Biometric Update in the comments.

Building velocity and gearing up for big things by year-end. 442 BILLION in fraud losses in 2025 (Interpol) and it’s only accelerating with AI. We are the only ones to catch modern fraud attempts with the greatest accuracy, scale and without adding unnecessary friction to consumers. 12 years of expertise focused in building the most trusted identity intelligence and a relentless innovation roadmap has us prepared today, and ready for tomorrow. On track to hit $450 million in ARR by the end of the year. $5.2 billion valuation. We are joined by 6000 customers to win the war against fraud. LFG!

Approximately 3.75 lakh customer records and 2,722 PDF documents have been exposed. The purported dataset includes customer names, loan applications, Know Your Customer (KYC) documents, account-opening forms and residential addresses, potentially creating opportunities for identity theft and financial fraud. Importantly, the alleged breach remains unverified. SBI had not publicly confirmed the claim according to the available account. Investigators have yet to establish whether the information is authentic, recently compromised or recycled from earlier incidents. Dark web advertisements frequently exaggerate stolen datasets to attract buyers. A Question Arises Are Banks Ready for Data Breach Penalties? Indias DPDP Act mandates stronger personal data protection, reasonable security safeguards and breach reporting. With penalties potentially reaching ₹250 crore for security safeguard failures, banks face significant financial exposure. The critical question is whether Indian banks have implemented adequate privacy controls, breach-response mechanisms and compliance frameworks to withstand regulatory scrutiny. PQC and Deepfake Protection: The Next Banking Security ImperativeBanks must accelerate adoption of Post-Quantum Cryptography (PQC) to safeguard sensitive financial data against future quantum threats. Simultaneously, AI-powered deepfake detection, biometric liveness verification and continuous identity authentication are essential to counter synthetic identities, voice cloning and impersonation fraud, strengthening customer protection and trust across digital banking ecosystems. #DataBreach #SBI #DPDPAct #DataPrivacy #CyberSecurity #BankingSecurity #PostQuantumCryptography #DeepfakeDetection #IdentityTheft #BFSI

One of the most sensitive accounts I own now trusts my face more than anything else I could give it. I added biometric verification to my IRS profile last week. Identity theft reports hit 1.4M in 2025, up about 20% over 2024. Reported fraud losses reached $16B...the highest on record. This year isn't trending any better. ITRC reported a record 1,803 data compromises in the first half of 2026, and Q2 was the second highest quarter they've ever recorded. Usernames, passwords, security questions, CC numbers, SSNs. All of it is already for sale on the dark web. Which is the whole problem with security questions and simple username/passwords. In my 20+ years in FinTech I've watched the industry defend these authentication protocols because they were cheap and simple. Nobody wanted to ask the customers for more because it added friction to the online experience. My read is every institution sitting on data worth stealing ends up in the same place: asking for proof that a live human is on the other end, that it's the right one.

“You can lose your phone, but you can’t lose your face.” When I first started at Ping Identity, this is how one of our partners described Ping Recognise product which uses privacy preserving facial biometrics and liveness detection to help protect against deepfakes and impersonation. Naturally I challenged him with the movie Face off starring Nicolas Cage and John Travolta. 😂 The concept is simple: what if your identity could be verified using your face, without relying on a password, a physical device or storing a traditional biometric template? One use case that really resonated with me was losing your phone overseas. Unfortunately this has happened to me a couple of times over the years. Your banking apps, MFA and identity verification are often tied to your phone. If you lose it, how do you prove you’re actually you? Ping Recognise can help with this There are some other interesting use cases too: - Frontline workers: Enabling secure access to shared devices - New devices: Securely enrolling a replacement phone without relying on SMS. - Reducing insurance claims fraud by identifying claimants identity before high value pay outs - healthcare access for clinicians on shared workstations - Contact centres: Preventing fraudsters from impersonating customers to reset credentials. - AI and deepfakes: Helping verify that the person authenticating is real, not an AI-generated impersonation. It’s a shift away from relying on something you have like a phone towards securely verifying who you are without compromising privacy. #PingIdentity #PingRecognize #DigitalIdentity #FraudPrevention

Visa latest Biannual Threats Report highlights a clear shift in the fraud landscape: as payment security continues to strengthen, fraudsters are increasingly exploiting human trust through AI-driven impersonation, social engineering, deepfakes, and sophisticated scams. The recent Fideuram–Intesa Sanpaolo AI impersonation scam is a powerful example of this evolving threat—showing how convincing AI-generated identities can manipulate even experienced financial professionals. The key takeaway: the future of fraud prevention is not only about securing transactions—it’s about protecting people from manipulation. https://lnkd.in/epPPCWAg

Verification proves who someone is in a single moment. Most fraud happens in the moments after. That gap is where identity is heading next - and it's the problem worth paying attention to.

Financial fraud prevention is entering a new era. For too long, many institutions have focused primarily on what happens inside the transaction. But by the time a suspicious transaction reaches the fraud engine, the fraudster may already have compromised the customers identity, taken control of a mobile number, changed devices or exploited a recycled number. This is why telecoms intelligence is becoming a critical layer of modern fraud prevention and identity management. A customers mobile number is no longer just a communication channel. It is deeply embedded in their digital identity, used for authentication, OTPs, account recovery, transaction authorization, and access to financial services. To continue reading: https://lnkd.in/e5iGps_B