Call authentication is a critical contact center technology, enabling contact centers and agents to verify caller identities, combat fraud, and maintain trust with customers. The rise in spoofing, robocalls, and call fraud threatens contact center operations, brand reputation, and customer security and satisfaction. Call authentication technologies are designed to address these risks, but traditional solutions are often ineffective, too expensive, or too frustrating for customers. Without superior phone call authentication technologies, contact centers must deal with the adverse impact of inbound call spoofing, robocalls, account takeovers, phishing and vishing attacks, and other forms of telephony-based fraud.
What is Call Authentication?
Call authentication is the process of verifying that the origin and identity of a caller is legitimate. Authentication is a way of combating spoofing, where criminals disguise themselves as legitimate callers by falsifying the caller ID information transmitted during a phone call. Call authentication is a way of confirming the identification and location of the caller.
The Need for Call Authentication Technology in Contact Centers
In an era where trust in communication systems is increasingly under attack, call authentication has become indispensable for contact centers. Fraudulent practices such as spoofing and social engineering are not only eroding customer confidence but also exposing businesses to significant financial and reputational risks. Since contact centers are the frontline of customer interaction for many organizations, ensuring secure and trustworthy communication is critical for maintaining operational efficiency and customer satisfaction. Contact center authentication software provides a reliable mechanism to verify the legitimacy of calls, offering protection against malicious activities while improving the overall customer experience. By implementing authentication technologies, businesses can safeguard their operations, build customer trust, and meet regulatory requirements, all while enhancing the overall experience for customers and agents alike.
Threats Addressed by Call Authentication
Call center authentication solutions are designed to address a number of threats, risks, and concerns for businesses, their brands, and customers.
Growing Threat of Spoofing Spoofing involves manipulating caller ID information to disguise the true origin of a call, often making it appear as though the call comes from a trusted source. This tactic is used extensively in scams, making it increasingly difficult for contact center agents to distinguish between legitimate customers and malicious actors. Without solutions for caller id spoofing prevention, spoofing can undermine trust in telephony systems and expose contact centers to potential security breaches and fraud.
Increase in Voice-Based Fraud Contact centers are a prime target for cybercriminals who exploit the human element of customer service. Fraudsters often use social engineering to deceive agents and gain access to sensitive information or accounts. Call authentication acts as a critical first line of defense, making it harder for attackers to impersonate customers and preventing unauthorized access.
Regulatory Requirements Compliance with data security and privacy regulations, such as GDPR, CCPA, and PCI DSS, has become a priority for contact centers. Many of these regulations require robust authentication measures to protect customer data and ensure secure communication. Call authentication helps contact centers meet these legal obligations, reducing the risk of fines or other penalties.
Diminishing Customer Trust A lack of call authentication can lead to breaches that compromise sensitive customer data, resulting in a loss of trust. Customers expect contact centers to prioritize their security, and implementing authentication protocols demonstrates a commitment to safeguarding their information. This not only bolsters confidence but also fosters long-term customer loyalty.
Inefficiencies and Higher Costs Contact centers often spend considerable time manually verifying callers through cumbersome processes such as security questions or knowledge-based authentication. This not only frustrates customers but also increases operational costs. Automated call authentication streamlines the call verification process, reducing call handling times and freeing up agents to focus on more complex tasks.
Telephony Denial-of-Service (TDoS) Attacks TDoS attacks overwhelm contact centers with a flood of illegitimate calls, disrupting operations and preventing legitimate customers from getting through. Call authentication helps identify and block these malicious calls in real-time, ensuring smooth operation and continuous customer access.
Damage to Brand Reputation A contact center that fails to prevent fraudulent or spoofed calls risks severe damage to its brand reputation. Customers who fall victim to scams involving spoofed calls may blame the organization, even if it is not directly at fault. Robust call authentication minimizes the likelihood of such incidents, protecting the company’s image and maintaining public trust.
Types of Call Authentication Solutions
Call centers may deploy a number of different types of call authentication technologies to guard against fraud, spoofing, and unauthorized access to accounts. These solutions fall into two categories: passive and active. Passive authentication analyzes caller behavior, voice characteristics, or device metadata during the call without requiring explicit action from agents or callers. Active authentication requires the caller to perform specific actions, like answering questions or providing a PIN.
STIR/SHAKEN Protocols
STIR (Secure Telephony Identity Revisited) and SHAKEN (Secure Handling of Asserted Information Using Tokens) are protocols designed to prevent caller ID spoofing. They use digital certificates to validate the legitimacy of a call’s origin and ensure that the displayed caller ID matches the actual source of the call.
Benefits
- Prevents caller ID spoofing, ensuring the authenticity of inbound and outbound calls.
- Builds trust with recipients by verifying the integrity of caller information.
- Reduces the likelihood of fraudulent calls reaching customers.
Limitations
- Limited coverage for legacy networks that do not support digital protocols.
- Effectiveness diminishes for international calls that may not adhere to STIR/SHAKEN standards.
Knowledge-Based Authentication (KBA)
KBA verifies callers by asking them to provide answers to predefined security questions or confirm personal information known only to them.
Benefits
- Simple to implement and widely understood by both contact center agents and callers.
- Requires no additional technology or infrastructure for callers.
Limitations
- Highly vulnerable to social engineering attacks, as fraudsters can often find or guess answers through publicly available information.
- Increasingly outdated due to customer frustration and advancements in more secure technologies.
Voice Biometrics
Voice biometrics analyze a caller’s unique voice characteristics to confirm their identity. It can operate actively (requiring specific phrases) or passively (analyzing normal speech during the conversation).
Benefits
- High accuracy in identifying legitimate users based on unique vocal patterns.
- Non-intrusive, particularly in passive implementations, as customers do not need to take extra steps.
Limitations
- Requires significant setup, including enrolling user voiceprints and training systems.
- Sensitive to background noise, call quality, or changes in the user’s voice (e.g., due to illness).
Multi-Factor Authentication (MFA)
MFA combines multiple forms of authentication, such as passwords, biometrics, and device verification, to establish caller identity. It often includes an out-of-band process, such as sending a code to the user’s mobile device.
Benefits
- Provides robust security by requiring more than one verification factor.
- Adaptable to various scenarios, including high-risk transactions or sensitive accounts.
Limitations
- Can be cumbersome for customers, requiring additional steps during calls.
- Implementation and operational costs can be significant, especially for large-scale deployments.
Behavioral Analytics
Behavioral analytics monitor user behavior, such as voice patterns, speaking cadence, and interaction tendencies, to detect anomalies and authenticate callers passively.
Benefits
- Operates seamlessly without requiring active participation from the caller.
- Adapts to changing fraud tactics by learning normal behavior over time.
Limitations
- High implementation costs and reliance on AI infrastructure.
- May produce false positives or negatives, impacting both legitimate callers and security.
ANI Validation/ANI Match
Automatic Number Identification (ANI) validation compares the incoming call’s number to a pre-approved list or database. ANI match is often used in scenarios where trusted numbers are already known.
Benefits
- Straightforward and effective for confirming calls from known or pre-approved numbers.
- Useful in industries with frequent repeat callers, such as financial services or healthcare.
Limitations
- Limited applicability for new or unknown callers whose numbers are not pre-registered.
- Vulnerable to spoofing if additional layers of validation are not implemented.
AI-Based Authentication Methods
AI-based authentication verify identities by leveraging artificial intelligence to analyze a wide range of data points, including caller behavior, metadata, and interaction context.
Benefits
- Provides adaptive, real-time decision-making to identify fraudulent or anomalous behavior.
- Capable of handling complex scenarios and evolving tactics used by fraudsters.
Limitations
- High cost of development and deployment, especially for contact centers with limited resources.
- Requires ongoing monitoring and updates to ensure accuracy and effectiveness.
SecureLogix®: Call Authentication, Security, and Branding
SecureLogix offers call authentication, branding, and security solutions that protect your business from threats and solve trust issues while reducing costs. For 20+ years, we have profiled, tracked, and defended customers against a rapidly evolving landscape of risks that threaten contact centers and unified communications networks. With proven technology and the most skilled team in the industry, we deliver solutions that protect some of the most complex contact centers and voice networks in the world.
SecureLogix® Orchestra One™: Cost-Effectively Authenticating Every Caller
Orchestra One™ is a call authentication and spoofing detection service that quickly and automatically verifies and authenticates each inbound call. With Orchestra One™, you can eliminate the need for KBA technologies that put customers through tedious and costly security interrogations. By automating authentication, Orchestra One™ helps improve contact center productivity, improves customer experiences, and reduces per-call costs throughout your contact center.
Key Features of Orchestra One™
Automated Authentication Quickly verify and authenticate every inbound call with automated, cloud-based call authentication and spoofing detection services.
Lowest Cost Authentication Orchestra One™ analyzes and orchestrates thousands of call details in concert with real-time carrier network metadata (including STIR/SHAKEN when present) to provide a verification/authentication score for each call at the lowest per-call price.
Solution Orchestration Orchestra One™ orchestrates media analysis and fraud detection tools to deliver multifactor authentication for the most at-risk calls — but only when those expensive services are needed.
Key Benefits of Orchestra One™
- Protect against call attacks and fraud.
- Reduce the cost and frustration of call authentication processes.
- Identify spoofed vs. trusted callers before each call is answered.
- Reduce call authentication costs by 50% vs. competitors.
- Increase customer satisfaction by eliminating the need for KBA solutions
- Reduce call duration by 30 seconds to reduce costs and improve customer satisfaction.
Additional Solutions from SecureLogix
SecureLogix is the only vendor providing a single, unified solution set for the complete range of telephony-based security and call trust issues that threaten the customer experience and the enterprise. Additional solutions for SecureLogix include:
TrueCall™ Spoofing Protection Service Outbound call software that identifies and blocks spoofed calls attempting to use your corporate calling numbers to impersonate your brand.
Reputation Defense™ Call Number Management Service Helps manage fraud/spam labeling attached to enterprise calling numbers to restore, monitor, and manage caller ID reputation.
Contact™ Call Branding Service Increases enterprise outbound call answer rates across all major wireless devices and services providers.
Call Defense™ System A call firewall that sits at the edge of your voice networking filters good traffic from bad in real time to block unwanted calls and keep your voice network secure from attack and disruption.
Call Secure™ Managed Service An implementation of Call Defense™ System managed by an industry-leading team of call security experts.
FAQ
Q: What is call authentication?
Call authentication is a process or technology that verifies whether a phone call is legitimate and confirms the identity of the caller. It ensures that the call originates from the claimed source, protecting recipients from scams or spoofing. This is typically achieved using protocols, digital certificates, or other verification mechanisms. Call authentication plays a vital role in maintaining secure and trustworthy communication systems, particularly for businesses and contact centers.
Q: Why is call authentication important?
Call authentication is critical for preventing fraudulent activities such as spoofing, phishing, and account takeovers. It protects sensitive customer data by ensuring that only verified callers gain access to confidential information. Additionally, it fosters trust in communication systems, encouraging customers to engage confidently with businesses. In sectors like finance and healthcare, where security is paramount, call authentication is essential for compliance with privacy regulations.
Q: How does call authentication combat spoofing?
Call authentication combats spoofing by verifying the true origin of a call and blocking those with falsified caller ID information. It uses advanced technologies, such as STIR/SHAKEN, to detect and filter out spoofed numbers before they reach the recipient. By identifying these illegitimate calls, authentication prevents scammers from deceiving individuals or businesses. This proactive approach significantly reduces the risk of fraud and protects brand reputation.
Q: What is STIR/SHAKEN?
STIR (Secure Telephony Identity Revisited) and SHAKEN (Secure Handling of Asserted Information Using Tokens) are protocols designed to validate the authenticity of caller ID information. They use digital certificates to confirm that the number displayed on the recipient’s device matches the actual origin of the call. STIR/SHAKEN is particularly effective at reducing spoofing and rebuilding trust in caller ID systems. However, its coverage may be limited for legacy networks and international calls.
Q: What are the challenges of call authentication?
One major challenge of call authentication is the high cost of implementation, especially for businesses with large or complex telephony systems. Integrating these technologies with legacy infrastructure can also be difficult, as older systems may not support modern authentication protocols. Additionally, user adoption can be a hurdle, as customers and agents may find new processes inconvenient or unfamiliar. To address these challenges, organizations must invest in scalable solutions and provide adequate training.
Q: How does call authentication improve customer trust?
Call authentication improves customer trust by ensuring that their interactions with businesses are secure and fraud-free. When customers see that calls are verified, they are more likely to answer and engage without fear of scams. It also demonstrates a company’s commitment to safeguarding sensitive information, reinforcing customer confidence. In turn, this trust fosters stronger relationships and enhances overall satisfaction, benefiting both customers and businesses.