SSA`s 'digital sniffers` help ferret out criminals

"It was like hitting a slot machine," recalled John Klarquist, director of technical audit at The Hartford Financial Services Group, Inc, one of the US`s largest insurance and financial services companies with assets approaching US$200-billion.

Klarquist had been called about a person suspected of fraudulently making out a cheque to him- or herself. Using the SSA-Name3 software from SearchSoftware America, the investigator and his associates keyed in the suspect`s name and were stunned to discover the individual had nearly US$106 000 in illegal cheques in procession. Before the search, no-one had been aware of the individual`s multiple illegal transactions.

Since installing the SSA-Name3 product on the in-house LAN, The Hartford team has detected and quantified all sorts of internal and external fraud, including premium and claim fraud by policyholders. The investigators have also shared this valuable information with auditors in other insurance firms, and believe the SSA software will enable companies to make inroads in thwarting fraud and help to control insurance rate increases for all policyholders.

Before the purchase of the SSA software, The Hartford`s auditing department had only one flat paid file that kept information on past employees. Weekly information from the insurer`s systems saved names and addresses, but they were in unformatted fields and could be tracked only be expensive and time consuming methods.

In fact, one search, analysing activities of more than 25 names during a five year period, cost US$100 000. Today, with SSA-Names3 running on the The Hartford`s LAN, auditors don`t even need to know exactly how to spell the name they are researching - a vast improvement over the previous system of guessing and entering countless options on spelling.

"This successful installation, one of well over 300 worldwide (including South Africa), illustrates one of the SSA products` most compelling advantages," remarks Sam Selmer-Olsen, a director of the recently appointed exclusive local agents for the SSA range, Bateleur Software Solutions. "This is the ability to reliably search or mine large scale databases using the names of people or companies and their addresses AND find candidate matches despite the unavoidable or deliberate variation and error in name, address and other bio-data.

"Some searching and matching systems require the investigator to know when and how to vary a search or change the search data to cause the system to work harder," Selmer-Olsen continues. "SSA`s intelligent search strategies are in-built, and designed not to miss candidates regardless of the way the data was entered. These search strategies provide real-time access to the name and address data, and still provide the quality and reliability required by investigators using or searching questionable data."

While diligent investigators can use sophisticated search tools well, Selmer-Olsen points out, it is not possible for the average user to spend day after day simply browsing historical data and do a good job selecting candidate matches; even the diligent user can get ineffectual at the job if it is a continuous activity.

To automate the searching, matching and clearing process it is necessary that computer systems 'mimic` the very best users when choosing amongst the possible matches. In the same way as human operators use names, addresses, dates, identity numbers and other data, the SSA software uses tuneable matching algorithms to rank, score or eliminate the candidates.

This makes the technology a powerful ally in not just the discovery of fraud, but the whole gamut of investigative, crime prevention and law enforcement applications, Selmer-Olsen believes.

For example in Australia, the New South Wales Police Service, as part of its COPS (Computerised Operational Policing System), unleashes the highly developed 'sniffing` capabilities of SSA-Names3 technology in the fight against theft of property.

Having previously employed SSA-Names3 in more traditional name searching and matching applications, the NSW Police Service decided that impressive results could be achieved in other areas. So, abetted by stringent new legislation requiring pawn shop owners to record detailed information about the seller of each item, the Police Service began assessing the benefits in relation to stolen and missing properties.

Early results are proving very promising. While it is impossible to replace the feeling of violation after having been robbed, the NSW Police Service is now taking another positive course of action in returning stolen property to its rightful owner and making it more difficult to dispose of, once it has been stolen

"In investigative applications, Selmer-Olsen continues, "SSA technology can further assist in performing 'fuzzy` searches on names and all other types of naming data.

"This is especially advantageous when one considers one of the common characteristics of the criminal mind, which is to use aliases or name variations over time. The underlying design of SSA-Name3 supports the idea of one-to-many relationships between people and their name(s). The software also compensates for the many types of name variations, intentional or otherwise, caused by the use of nick-names, missing or extra words, word order variations, spelling and other types of variations.

"Bearing in mind the myriad advantages of SSA software in the crime prevention realm, it is not uncommon for the system to pay for itself within the first month, as was the case at The Hartford."