Vocent Announces Industry's First True Multi-Factor Voice Authentication Solution

MOUNTAIN VIEW , Calif. — Vocent Solutions Inc., announced the industry's first true multi-factor voice authentication solution.  The company also released quantifiable results from a large-scale pilot project with Scotiabank, a $200 billion financial services institution.

 

"A company is always excited to release a breakthrough technology," said Vocent's CEO Chuck Buffum, "but for Vocent, the greater pleasure is in announcing that our solution has been proven to help real companies overcome real business challenges." 

 

With rampant identity theft costing North American businesses nearly $100 billion annually, Scotiabank conducted a pilot project to evaluate a variety of technologies and methodologies for authenticating customers over the telephone.  Included in the extensive pilot was Vocent Confirmed CallerTM, a packaged application that incorporates Vocent DecisionMaker. 

 

The bank piloted Vocent's voice authentication solution as an alternative to content-based approaches, in which agents require customers to answer personal questions or recall personal identification numbers.  The content-based approaches compromise security and decrease customer satisfaction by relying on personal information that can be easily discovered.  The firm also evaluated authentication systems that use only voice biometrics, but discovered that such systems do not offer strong enough security or sufficient automation rates for large-scale consumer deployments. 

 

Vocent's multi-factor system integrates the ease of voice biometrics along with other factors, such as content knowledge and the caller's phone number, with the additional security layers of advanced logic, risk modeling and dynamic dialog management.  During the trial, Scotiabank successfully authenticated 95 percent of callers, while reducing false accept rates to below 1 percent.  The Vocent system also helps to improve the customer experience by reducing the number of questions callers are asked during identity verification.

 

"While voice authentication solutions offer very compelling benefits, key metrics for security and automation must be met," said Rick Davidson, Director, Electronic Banking, Channel RandD at Scotiabank.  "Vocent's approach has proven far more robust than any of the other voice authentication systems we have tested, and is the only system we have tested that delivers the security and automation rates we require for consumer deployment."

 

Many of the most recognized companies, including Marriott, US Bank and Inovant (a Visa Solutions company) employ Vocent's technologies to mitigate risks and improve IT efficiencies.  Vocent DecisionMaker is now commercially available as part of Vocent Confirmed Caller and Vocent Password Reset, which can be purchased direct from Vocent or through its expanding sales channel.