3 posts tagged with "Telecom Security"

In the dynamic telecom landscape, fraudsters and businesses continually devise new schemes to exploit vulnerabilities, causing significant financial and reputational damage to operators and consumers alike. Increasingly carriers are facing the risks posed by Wangiri and flash calls, which are hard but not impossible to stop. The danger of these attacks are specifically large considering this fraud is hard to distinguish from regular traffic although fraudsters have a broad victim(customer)–base and can cause major revenue and reputation losses. Solutions like Sinapsio are at the forefront of battling such deceptive practices with advanced AI-based solutions.

Understanding Wangiri Fraud​

Wangiri Fraud is not a novel concept but has evolved with technology. Originating from Japanese language, "Wangiri" means "one (ring) and cut." The scam involves a fraudster calling a number and hanging up after one ring, prompting the curious recipient to call back. These return calls often redirect to premium-rate numbers, incurring hefty charges that benefit the scammer.

According to the Communications Fraud Control Association (CFCA), this type of fraud was among the top five methods causing an estimated loss of $2.23 billion to the telecom industry in 2021.

Despite its longstanding presence, Wangiri fraud remains persistent, intelligently mixed with organic traffic and thus evading detection. Overall, Wangiri (and its variants) is highly attractive to fraudsters:

• they incur very low costs (no charge on missed calls),

• it is spread over whole countries, even globally,

• loss per single customer is not so relevant (but in total it is in billions)

• no direct loss for telecoms ( but loss of reputation, trust etc)

Often, Wangiri is seen as a thing of the past. But do not be mistaken, this form of fraud still places second in the world’s most typical fraud risks. Wangiri attackers use a variety of strategies, beginning with traffic scanning, sending “waves” to flood carriers, and ultimately mixing and disguising it with normal traffic and simulating organic growth. Traditional systems, however, are not capable of combatting many forms of Wangari fraud. They are mostly reacting to CDR analysis and growing pressure on customer support. Thus, traditional anti-fraud systems simply cannot detect and see the attack happening in real-time. Besides the operators are facing a huge problem: how to distinguish good calls from malicious ones.

Simply blocking a certain originating breakout or the whole country can be effective yet damaging. Damaging, as good callers would also be punished, often leading to a situation where many countries would be blocked, causing degraded customer satisfaction and service quality. Furthermore, this solution can never be permanent, as fraudsters adapt their strategy faster than ever.

The Rise of Flash Calls​

While Wangiri calls are a fraud by its definition, “Flash calls” are very different and the clarity whether it is fraud or not is not that plausible. Having very similar behaviour on the signalling level, they share very little similarities in regards of their targeted result. They are typically associated with bypassing traditional SMS A2P streams, used for identity proof (usually associated with 2FA authentication).

Flash calls are a great example how technology and innovation can result in new schemes to exploit vulnerabilities, causing significant financial leakages for MNOs.

Flash-calls from different perspectives:

• they incur very low costs (no charge on missed calls),

• it is spread over whole countries, even globally,

• loss per single customer is not so relevant (but in total it is in billions)

• no direct loss for telecoms ( but loss of reputation, trust etc)

Now, the markets are cheering the new service while cornering MNOs, (miss)using their infrastructure for free and monetizing at the expense of the other.

While MNOs are the clear losers here, the question is what they can do to enforce a fair monetization – for the usage of their networking services.

The answer is rather simple: modern anti-fraud solutions are vital to ward off the dangers of flash calling.

According to Juniper, Flash Call volumes are set to increase by a 25-fold until 2026. Although some operators and firewall vendors consider them a form of SMS OTP bypass fraud, their classification as fraudulent varies. However, it is clear that these calls pose a major revenue leakage risk, as the brevity of flash calls makes them harder to trace.

Flash Calls - Are they fraud?​

The debate around flash calls, and their role in the industry is one that is greatly disagreed on within the industry and amongst regulators. Considering flash calls have no duration and are thus unbillable, many operators not even have a technical ability to consider the risk of these calls. This not only poses confusions to customers, reputation, and revenues, but also a risk to personal and informational safety; thereby further growing the risks.

• Many governments have not implemented regulation on flash calls for OTP delivery.

• The existing contractual relationships are not violated when flash calls are used, as these contracts were mostly drafted long before the adoption modern smartphones.

• loss per single customer is not so relevant (but in total it is in billions)

However, the choice of ignoring flash calls and delaying active measures, is often followed by decreased reputations, decrease in A2P messaging services and an overall decline in revenues. Thus, modern anti-fraud solutions are vital to ward off the dangers of flash calling.

Sinapsio's Response to Telecommunications Fraud​

To tackle these threats, Sinapsio's AI-driven tools provide a market-unique, real-time detection and prevention, adapting to new patterns of fraudulent activity. It's crucial for mobile network operators to integrate robust fraud prevention and monetization strategies into their 2023 business plans to protect their revenue and customer trust. It is vital that carriers stay one step ahead of Wangiri and Flash Fraudsters to protect their customers; which can easily be done with a system like Sinapsio’s. Sinapsio’s systems are designed to detect and analyse patterns consistent with Wangiri and flash call schemes. Moreover, our systems are capable of learning alongside fraudsters, updating our protective shield autonomously and constantly. Using real-time data, our solutions can identify and flag suspicious numbers, even when tactics shift, or new patterns emerge. As the telecommunication landscape continues to grow, vigilance against such schemes is paramount. Sinapsio remains at the forefront, harnessing the power of AI to safeguard the telecom industry from these fraudulent activities.

Telco is essential in today’s world – we all know safe and reliable communication channels keep the world’s economies going. However, telco operators and clients face a persistent adversary – fraud. Further, traditional anti-fraud methods are struggling against today’s sneaky fraudsters, leaving networks, revenues, and customers at risk.

Enter Sinapsio, our innovative fraud detection system designed to identify and combat fraudulent activities in real-time, with complete autonomy and ease. Today we introduce you to our founders, Emir Tresnjo and Nikola Jevtic, who have been gathering expertise in the industry for decades but are secretly professional basketball players.

We bring you an interview, where we dive into why Sinapsio was created, what sets us apart, and talk about our founders journeys as they tell us about what they like the most in their jobs.

Why We Need Sinapsio - What inspired the creation of Sinapsio?​

Our founders have the same perspective based on the knowledge the team has gathered – Sinapsio exists because telco needs a different – better, more accurate and cost friendly approach – to anti fraud.

Emir: Well, that is a good question. Creation of Sinapsio was a long process, with a lot of learning. Betatel created Sinapsio to combat the huge issue that telco is facing on fraud. Every day we spent in the industry we say that there was a missing piece of safety in the market, so we had this purpose to make communications safer and protect retail users from any danger.

Nikola: We have been in the telco industry for a long time. Each of the partners had a somewhat different experience and background. What was common for all of us was that we were well aware of the existence of telco fraud. We were facing it every day and fighting it on a small scale using various techniques. From firewall rules, database scripts, black–white lists, etc. There has been a discussion from time to time on the topic of fighting fraud detected on traffic that we had running. At one point we decided to create a project that would combine tools and methods that we have been using so far, and create a universal tool that will do fraud detection in a real-time. Our goal was to protect us, as well as our partners from malicious calls. Also, we wanted to create an image of ourselves to be a company that has zero tolerance for fraud. And it worked.

We Are Different - How does Sinapsio differentiate itself from other fraud detection systems?​

Both Emir and Nikola say it simply. Sinapsio’s key selling points target exactly the missing pieces of traditional anti fraud; the aspect of offering a real time protection solution.

Emir: We are innovative with the technology we deploy and how we use it to offer a real time solution- thats what is really our key differentiation. Our aim was to leverage AI to offer real-time, autonomous fraud detection, moving beyond the reactive measures that have become industry standard. As an anti fraud system, Sinapsio has a major focus on REAL TIME fraud prevention. What that means for our customers, is that Sinapsio is not just a prevention system, but it is also a preemptive system: meaning it does not allow fraudsters to have any business case to even start with.

Nikola: Firstly, it is a result of our own experience, not a copycat or reverse-engineered piece of software. So by default, it had to be unique. Second, we noticed that the speed at which we were getting results was really high. It was sufficient to try to use it at the same time the call was received before it has been answered. Hence, by definition, it was a real-time protection. After creating a core of the product engine, and testing it, we have decided to go with the creation of a full-blown product, with API, add-ons, storage database, powerful searches, frontend, reports, and much more.

We Can Be Proud - What are you the proudest of since Sinapsio’s launch?​

Our founders are not only basketball players – but basketball (and general) team members. And, they love to grow and develop – until the product became perfect.

Emir: Personally, the journey for Sinapsio has brought me closer to my team that combats fraud on the daily basis. I enjoy learning about my teams’ and clients’ experiences and problems, to create new solutions that focus on the key pain points. This is what we work to be at Sinapsio; the customers’ solution.

Nikola: Let’s start with the bad news first. We had downtimes and crashes for the first few months after launching. It made us think about and create a powerful availability design. Also, because we had outages during the night, we had to create an automated recovery system that ran in case of unpredicted errors. Since then, we had installations that run for years, without a need for an intervention. Now, we have systems that have been automatically updated through continuous integration, and that are running literally for years without an error.

What We Love - What is your favourite part about your job at Sinapsio?​

We love our clients. We love to work for and with our clients and partners.

Emir: The social aspect. Thats the simple and straight forward answer. My job enables me contacts with people all over the world, which also gives me an opportunity to develop personal connections with these people. Through Sinapsio – and Betatel- I’ve developed some lasting friendships and meaningful connections to our partners and clients alike, from which I have learned and grown significantly.

Nikola: It would be the challenges that we have faced through the development and adaptation of the software. Each customer has slightly different requests and needs, and creating easily adaptable software has been a difficult task that we are constantly facing. And, of course, the satisfaction that we get when seeing fraudsters giving up on attempts is one of the little things that makes our day.

A Tech Question - How does the Sinapsio suite ensure high call quality while preventing Wangiri calls?​

Nikola: Our focus has always been on keeping a call quality high. We were struggling to keep PDD (delay time) at a minimum, while still providing real-time protection. We changed the databases and models we were using several times until we reached a satisfactory response time under high traffic flow. To achieve that, we had to develop a testing system that could show us any potential flow in a system design. Also, there was an out-of-the-box approach that I would like to keep a secret at this time.

Bringing Sinapsio to You - What are the key benefits of integrating Sinapsio's solutions into a telecom company's existing infrastructure?​

Emir: By integrating Sinapsio in your infrastructure, you will gain access to an almost instant overview over your traffic. Because the system is actively reacting in real time, you will almost instantly have reactions your network. While this is not only vital for protection, it is also amazing and highly rewarding to see the immediate impact with such comfort.

For more information on Sinapsio and our revolutionary approach to fraud prevention, we invite you to visit Sinapsio .

Sinapsio leads the charge in telecom fraud prevention with a proactive, AI-driven approach. As telecom fraud evolves rapidly, operators must respond swiftly. Sinapsio’s expertise enables real-time fraud detection from the moment a call is placed, learning and adapting continuously to outsmart fraudsters.

Our defense process is built on four key pillars​

• Signaling Stage Firstly, in the Signaling stage of calls, Sinapsio’s proactive stance is a powerful tool, as we operate directly within the call path to evaluate and make real-time decisions during call setup. This immediate action ensures that potential fraud is intercepted before it can impact the network. While this does not disturb those placing the call and it requires no intervention from clients, Sinapsio can already defect and prevent fraud autonomously from the first seconds.

• During call duration Sinapsio’s vigilance extends throughout the call duration, where the system continuously monitors for anomalies, maintaining an unwavering guard against fraud. This persistent oversight ensures that any suspicious patterns are swiftly detected and addressed.As patterns change, Sinapsio’s AI learns and adapts, changing our defense in advance to any larger revenue or safety losses for our customers. And patterns change faster than ever today, making agile antifraud systems a necessity.

• Call post-processing Once the call ends, our third stage begins. In the third stage, Call Post-Processing, Sinapsio pioneers the market due its dynamic learning capabilities. By processing vast amounts of data, the system not only responds to current threats but also adapts to anticipate future ones. This learning aspect is integral to Sinapsio’s strategy, ensuring long-term protection, in a constantly evolving environment of threats.

• Analytics dashboard Once the call ends, our third stage begins. In the third stage, Call Post-Processing, Sinapsio pioneers the market due its dynamic learning capabilities. By processing vast amounts of data, the system not only responds to current threats but also adapts to anticipate future ones. This learning aspect is integral to Sinapsio’s strategy, ensuring long-term protection, in a constantly evolving environment of threats.

Sinapsio’s methodical approach to fraud prevention, marked by these four pillars, defines its uniqueness in the industry. It is essential to understand, that this uniqueness defines the safety of our clients in comparison to traditional antifraud solutions. Clients can experience a meticulously managed product that promises and delivers a secure, high-quality communication service without the need for direct oversight. Sinapsio embodies the next generation of autonomous, real-time fraud detection and prevention, that has become essential in todays markets already.

How Can Sinapsio prevent Fraud?​

Facing complex challenges, operators must use comprehensive and preventative antifraud solutions. Sinapsio offers autonomous and all-encompassing solutions. And better yet, we offer free trials of our products.