Spot, Stop, and Secure Your Contact Centre Against Frauds

One day, Sarah, a loyal bank customer receives a call from who she believes to be a representative of her bank, and unwittingly becomes the target of a sophisticated contact centre fraud. A scammer, posing as a bank official, convinces her of suspicious account activity. Using clever social engineering tactics, and authoritative jargon, they prey on her concerns, coaxing her into sharing sensitive details. Within minutes of sharing the sensitive information, Sarah's account bears the brunt of unauthorised transactions.

The experience described above is all too common in today’s day and age, highlighting the importance of vigilance and the perils of misplaced trust. With the advent of deep fake and AI technology, even the scammers are upgrading their methods of conning.

‍What is Contact Centre Fraud?

Contact centre fraud is a deceptive practice where scammers call contact centres or use digital channels, posing as genuine customers, to gain access to private data or manipulate account controls. Armed with stolen or fabricated information, they deceive contact centre agents or unsecured digital systems, aiming to gain control over genuine customer accounts, make unauthorised transactions, or steal sensitive data.

5 Types of Contact Centre Frauds

‍Account Takeover

Account takeover happens when scammers use stolen customer identities to gain unauthorised access to their account, often changing login credentials to lock out the genuine user.

Scammers obtain personal details through phishing emails, data breaches, or social engineering tactics.

Let’s understand this with the help of the below example.  

Tom receives an email that appears to be from his bank, asking him to confirm his login details due to a 'security check'. He clicks the link and enters his details on a fake website that looks exactly like his bank’s website. Within moments, he's locked out of his account, and funds are being transferred to an offshore account.  

Identity Theft

Scammers impersonate a genuine customer using their personal details to create new accounts or access existing ones.  

They gather the customer’s personal information from various sources, including discarded bills, social media, or data breaches.

Jane, while selling her old furniture online, shares her contact details on a public forum. A scammer uses this information, combined with other details found on her social media, to apply for a store credit card. Jane is unaware until she receives a bill for hundreds of pounds worth of purchases she never made.  

Card Not Present (CNP) Scams

Transactions are made online or over the phone without physically presenting the payment card.

Scammers capture an unsuspecting customer’s credit card details and use the stolen information to make unauthorised purchases.

Sophie loves shopping online and recently found a website selling handcrafted jewellery at a significant discount. The site looks professional, complete with customer reviews and secure payment badges. Excited, she decides to purchase a necklace and inputs her credit card details.

A week later, while checking her bank statement, Sophie notices several online transactions she doesn't recognise, totalling over £500. Confused and alarmed, she contacts her bank. After an investigation, it's revealed that the jewellery website was a front for scammers. While the site looked legitimate, it was set up to capture card details for fraudulent CNP transactions. Sophie's details were used to purchase electronics, gift cards, and other high-value items from various online retailers.  

IVR Mining

In this fraud, hackers target the IVR systems of businesses to extract information or manipulate account credentials.

By making automated or manual calls to these systems, scammers navigate through the IVR menu, attempting to access confidential data or reset account details. They exploit weak security measures, such as easily guessable PINs or security questions, to gain unauthorised access. This method can lead to data breaches, unauthorised transactions, or account takeovers, posing significant risks to both businesses and their customers.

A bank's IVR system receives repeated calls from an automated system trying different PIN combinations. After numerous attempts, the system successfully accesses several customer accounts, leading to unauthorised fund transfers.  

Phishing Calls

Scammers pose as representatives from legitimate businesses, aiming to extract sensitive information from unsuspecting individuals.

Using a mix of fear, urgency, and authority, they convince individuals to share personal or financial details.

Emily receives a call from someone claiming to be from her internet service provider. The caller states that her service will be terminated due to unpaid bills unless she makes an immediate payment over the phone. Worried about losing her connection, Emily provides her bank details, only to later discover that the call was a scam.

Chatbot Manipulation

Chatbot manipulation is an emerging cybersecurity concern where cyber criminals exploit automated chat systems, often integrated into websites for customer support or enquiry resolution. These chatbots, designed to interpret and respond to customer inputs, can be deceived or overwhelmed if proper security measurements are not put in place.  

Scammers employ a range of tactics, from feeding chatbots with scripted or algorithmically generated inputs to trick them into revealing sensitive information, to flooding them with a barrage of enquiries, causing system slowdowns or crashes. Some sophisticated attackers even use chatbots to probe for vulnerabilities within a website's infrastructure.  

For instance, by understanding the chatbot's design and response patterns, a scammer might manipulate the conversation to bypass security protocols or gain unauthorised access to backend data. As businesses increasingly rely on chatbots for automation and efficiency, ensuring their security and resilience against such manipulations becomes paramount.

Identifying and Preventing Contact Centre Fraud

CINNOX Protects your Business Against Contact Centre Frauds

For a business, being approachable across all channels of communication is of utmost importance, and ensuring the security and integrity of these channels of communications has become equally crucial, if not more. CINNOX is one of Asia’s leading unified communications platforms that has been at the forefront of this battle against fraud, ensuring that the conversations between businesses and their customers are always protected.

High Security & Compliance

CINNOX places customer data protection and security at the zenith of its priorities. Our platform employs state-of-the-art data encryption, backup, and recovery systems. We are GDPR compliant and have been independently audited, receiving certifications like ISO 9001, ISO 20000, ISO 27001, and ISO 27017. These certifications vouch for our commitment to quality management, IT service management, information security, and cloud security and data protection.

Distributed Architecture

CINNOX’s decentralised approach to data management, enhancing security, compliance, and performance plays a pivotal role in safeguarding businesses against frauds. Our platform is designed to cater to a diverse range of business requirements, ensuring optimal efficiency and security.

1. Hybrid Cloud Support

Every business has unique needs. We understand this. Which is why we offer hybrid cloud support, private cloud, public cloud, and on-premises solutions allowing businesses to leverage the best of both private, and public cloud ecosystems. Apart from optimising operational efficiency, this also keeps sensitive data on a private cloud, while utilising the public cloud for other tasks.

2. Localised Data Storage

Our distributed structure ensures that your business and customer data is stored in a designated cloud location, adhering to the local and industry regulations. For example, if your business is engaging with a customer in Singapore, the data be stored in a cloud in Singapore, not elsewhere. This ensures compliance with regional data protection laws, enhancing trust and security.

3. Reliable Network Performance

Our 28 globally distributed, points of presence or PoP sites ensure network reliability and stability. This not only helps in reducing latency, but also improves speed, and ensures a high level of multimedia experience, while maintaining high standards of security.  

4. Security Synergy with Tech Partners

We work closely with tech suppliers who prioritise security, such as AWS, Equinix, Google, and Microsoft. These strategic partnerships ensure that our platform remains continually fortified with the latest security measures, providing your business with a secure, reliable, and scalable communication solution.  

True Communications Convergence

CINNOX's convergence model bridges the gaps between various communication networks, ensuring reliable solutions across protocols, devices, and services. This includes device convergence (sharing information across devices), channel convergence (bridging the gap between traditional telephony and digital channels), protocol convergence (unifying different communication protocols), and network convergence (integrating video, phone, and data communication).

Carrier-grade Performance and Reliability

With an annual uptime of 99.95%, CINNOX assures real-time service delivery, monitoring, and support round the clock. Our globally distributed IP network ensures high-performance connections, supporting multiple protocols and multi-codec conversions to enable businesses to scale without worries.

Seamless System Integration

CINNOX enhances digital transformation by integrating communication channels with backend enterprise and telephone systems. This ensures a seamless flow of data from customers to the business’s internal systems. It's compatible with third-party ticketing systems, CRMs, Online Charging Systems, and PBXs.

Data Encryption & Protection

CINNOX employs various data encryption methods to ensure information and identity security. This includes data encryption both in-transit and at rest, messaging encryption, call encryption, and application-specific encryption.

Our dedication to data protection extends beyond mere encryption. CINNOX empowers staff administrators with precise role and permission settings, ensuring controlled access to sensitive data. Two-factor authentication (2FA) bolsters account security by adding an extra layer of security to access account. Detailed audit logs offer transparency on all customer activities and engagement data, while IP and phone number whitelisting and blacklisting ensures only trusted personnel can connect. Moreover, CINNOX’s data retention policies guarantee data is stored securely and only for necessary durations.  

By combining all capabilities, CINNOX ensures a holistic approach to data protection, safeguarding against potential vulnerabilities and threats.  

By leveraging these robust security measures and innovative tech solutions, CINNOX provides businesses with a secure environment, drastically reducing the risks associated with contact centre frauds. Whether it's through ensuring data encryption, maintaining high compliance standards, or facilitating seamless communication convergence, CINNOX stands as an unshakeable barrier against potential threats in the digital communication landscape.