South African Fraud Prevention Service’s SAFPS is a section 21 (not for profit) company which is funded by its members annual subscriptions. Its primary objective is to provide fraud prevention data-sharing services between organisations in the banking, retail, financial services, telecommunications, motor vehicle finance and insurance industries.
Their services can be summarized as follows:
The Shamwari Database - A database of fraudulent behaviour on the part of persons attempting to obtain goods or services or who are involved in fraudulent activity in the workplace. SAFPS members are able to access the database when conducting business with such persons to ascertain if the subject has previously been reported for fraudulent behaviour with other organisations. The system is able to link identity numbers, names, telephone numbers and other relevant data in order to identify both individual and syndicate type fraud.
Protective Registration - An internet based free service to the general public for the registration of lost or stolen personal documents including identity books, drivers’ licenses, passports and similar documents. Registrations can also be made through a fax on demand service for people who do not have access to the Internet. All registrations are circulated to members twice per day in order to prevent any attempts at impersonation, commonly called identity theft. The service has recently been enhanced to allow for the registrations of lost and stolen documents from any country in the world.
Employment Application Fraud & Employee Fraud Database - A database of fraudulent behaviour on the part of employees attempting to obtain goods or services or who are involved in fraudulent activity in the workplace.
Data Analysis Service that develops matches across a variety of data fields in milli seconds and portrays the data in graphic format.
The DataCink Fraud Syndicate Service which identifies fraud syndicates operating throughout the country. An e-mail warning is distributed to all SAFPS members as soon as a syndicate is identified.
SAFPS subscribers can report any cases of fraud to the SAFPS and this information is then shared with other subscribers, forming the basis of the database.
Working with Compuscan to Prevent Fraud
SAFPS information is available through the Compuscan Credit-Check System, providing clients with additional fraud information on a person’s credit profile.
The SAFPS report will indicate whether or not a client has been loaded on the SAFPS database and for what reason. The reason is indicated by a category number, as listed below:
CATEGORY 1 :
False Name And I.D – Existing / False Address
CATEGORY 2 :
Using Particulars Of Another Person (Apparent Impersonation)
CATEGORY 3 :
Genuine Name, ID And Address – False Employer Particulars
CATEGORY 4 :
Genuine Name, ID And Address – Other False Hoods
CATEGORY 5 :
Victim of Impersonation
CATEGORY 6 :
Suspicion of Opening or Operating an Account for Improper Purposes / Evading Liability
CATEGORY 7 :
Employee/Employment Application Fraud
CATEGORY 8 :
Taking Out an Insurance Policy For Improper Purposes or for Making an Improper Claim Under an Insurance Policy
CATEGORY 9 :
Category Nine Discontinued With Effect From 14th September 2006
CATEGORY 10 :
Persona Unknown Fraud
CATEGORY 11 :
Suspect Fraud-Declined
CATEGORY 0 :
Protective Registration
If you select this additional service, whenever a Compuscan enquiry is performed an SAFPS enquiry will be done simultaneously.
If the enquiry returns fraud-related information, the following will be seen on the Compuscan Credit Report.
Subscribers are then able to find out more details relating to a specific incident by clicking on ‘View detailed report’.
Registering Fraud through Credit Check
You are also able to report fraudulent activities. You will find the fraud registration button on the Credit-Check report page under the Definite Match data-block:
After supplying all the relevant information you can press the SUBMIT button to send the information. The data will then be sent to the SAFPS who will verify the data before it gets registered on their system and subsequently update the Credit-Check database
Triggers & Alerts (CompuWatch)
In addition, the Compuscan Triggers & Alerts (CompuWatch) function also includes a “Fraud Alerts on Your Clients”. When one of your clients is added to the SAFPS database, you will be notified via the Change / Conflicts Log.
Differences between a Shamwari and Protective Registration Filings:
All Shamwari database filings will be prefixed with the letters SH.
All Protective Registration filings will be prefixed with the letters PR.
Please Note: It is of utmost importance that member employees who deal with SAFPS matters are fully aware of the differences between a Shamwari Filing and a Filing for Protective Registration and that applicants for goods and services, clients of members and other parties who have applied for Protective Registration are not declined facilities because of their Protective Registration filing.
The Protective Registration filing is intended to provide the applicant with a measure of protection against Impersonation and Identity Theft. It is the responsibility of the SAFPS member dealing with such an applicant to ensure and confirm identity and not rely solely on the Protective Registration.
DataCink Service and Other Services
SAFPS also provides the DataCink Service to its members as part of their annual membership fee. Each time a new filing is made to Shamwari by a member, the system will automatically check to see if the ID number or telephone number already exists in the files. All duplications will be notified to members by e-mail. This service will provide the early identification of suspect fraud syndicate activity. By prior arrangement members may also forward data to SAFPS in batch format for analysis against the Shamwari system. All data supplied will by destroyed after matching has taken place. Should a link be created by a match then SAFPS in co-operation with the supplying member will ensure that the link is filed to the Shamwari system.
SAFPS will be introducing its new DataMatch Service with effect from 1st March 2010. The new service will be provided free to fully paid up members of SAFPS and will also be available to non members on an annual fee payment as indicated hereunder. The service will allow members and users to batch load identity numbers and telephone numbers and upload these to the SAFPS system via a secure FTP (SFTP) program. The system will then match these numbers against data sent in from other users and will develop a match in an excel format. This will then be automatically sent back to users indicating all matches found. Should any of the numbers be listed in the SAFPS Shamwari system then this will be indicated in the return notification but only if the user is a full SAFPS member. No Shamwari data will be available to non members. It is emphasized that the matching of the identity and telephone numbers need not be related to fraud issues but can be used for any form of transactional business and is intended to assist users in identifying multiple transactional or application attempts across industry boundaries, but without such conduct actually being fraudulent.
For a copy of the new SAFPS Code of Conduct, please click here.
Should you wish to sign up for this value adding data or if you have any questions, please do not hesitate to contact us at Tel: 021 888 6000 or info@compuscan.co.za
