Protecting payments and expanding access
Every organization, across industries, wants stronger fraud and payment protection without adding friction to the customer experience. That’s why we’re continually evolving how and where account validation, authentication, and fraud solutions can be deployed, with more risk signals to come.
🔍This issue covers:
✅ New fraud and validation insights from recent studies
✅ Launch of BankValidation.com
✅ More flexible microdeposit authentication with vAuth®
✅ Faster testing and implementation workflows
✅ Platform modernization and security enhancements
📊Market insights
Validation continues to deliver measurable results
Working with organizations across the payments ecosystem gives us a front-row seat to how leading companies approach payment risk. One thing remains consistent: account validation is no longer optional. It’s a foundational control that helps improve payment outcomes, reduce exceptions, and create a stronger starting point for risk management.
In a recent study, we observed:
Validated accounts experience up to 50% fewer unsuccessful payments
Transactions involving unvalidated accounts increased fraud rates to 6.4x higher than average
Owner authentication adds an additional layer
Validation confirms the account is open and eligible for payments. Confirming the account ownership provides another valuable layer of protection.
Recent analysis on verified accounts found:
Accounts that could not be matched to the stated owner had 6.8 x higher fraud rates
A more complete view
Validation and authentication are highly effective controls that remain foundational, but some forms of risk can still pass checks such as:
- First-party fraud
- Mule accounts
- Coordinated fraud activity
These risks often become visible only when looking beyond the account itself and evaluating the broader relationships surrounding the applicant, including identity, contact information, and network connections that may indicate synthetic identity or organized fraud activity.
In a recent study, we evaluated fraud risk indicators focused on these types of patterns.
The results:
Segments flagged by these indicators experienced a 40% higher return rate than other validated and authenticated accounts
This demonstrates the value of layering in broader fraud intelligence along with account validation and authentication solutions, enabling organizations to optimize customer experiences, increase approvals, and gain deeper insight into payment risk.
🧱 New: BankValidation.com
As we expand the channels for accessing our leading account validation data, we’re excited to introduce BankValidation.com—a simple way to instantly verify bank accounts, no integration required. Designed for smaller organizations looking for quick, on-demand account verification, BankValidation.com provides instant access for a user to check account status and ownership insights through an easy-to-use interface, helping you get the answers you need in seconds.
Key benefits:
- Mitigate payment risk and fraud
Identify accounts that are unable to be collected upon due to the account being invalid or closed. - Accelerate onboarding
Validate account ownership with real-time responses to streamline approvals and reduce friction. - Access industry-leading data
Empower your organization with a path to critical verification intelligence when it matters most. - Human-in-the-loop decisioning
Support exception handling and operational reviews with an interface designed for fast manual account validation.
Enhanced: vAuth microdeposit flexibility
Driven by client feedback, we’ve expanded our microdeposit solution, vAuth ®, to offer a new API-only implementation option, giving organizations greater flexibility in how they deploy instant microdeposit authentication. With this enhancement, organizations can now leverage ValidiFI’s instant microdeposit capabilities behind the scenes while maintaining complete control of the customer experience. The API-only approach allows clients to build and manage their own user interface, branding, and workflows, while ValidiFI handles the authentication process in the background.
Key benefits:
- Greater control over onboarding flows with fast microdeposits for validation
- API-only availability to support your branded customer experiences
- Continued support of the ValidiFI experience when speed-to-market is critical
New feature:
- We’ve also introduced a new capability that allows organizations to cancel pending microdeposit requests when potential fraud is identified, helping stop suspicious activity earlier in the authentication process and reducing downstream risk.*
*Cancellation functionality is supported for non-instant payment rails prior to network submission.
Faster testing & workflow improvements
To make testing with ValidiFI faster and easier, we’ve introduced a new self-service file validation experience. The tool automatically reviews test file formats and field mappings before submission, helping teams identify and resolve issues earlier in the process, reduce rework, and accelerate time to results.
Key benefits:
- New user interface for data study validation and submissions
- Faster issue resolution before file submission, enabling faster turnaround
- Improved SFTP capabilities
Platform, security, stability & modernization
What’s included:
- Security updates, platform hardening, and framework improvements
- Continued platform modernization
- Consolidation of select legacy products
- Automated decryption, validation, and contribution workflows
These updates help strengthen reliability, improve operational resilience, and support the delivery of future innovations.
🔮Looking ahead
We’re continuing to invest in:
- Military Lending Act (MLA): Confirm military status in support of Military Lending Act compliance.
- Workflow optimization: Enhancing exceptions to further streamline processes.
- Performance improvements: Continued process enhancements, model maintenance, and more.
Whether you’re looking to improve payment performance, strengthen fraud defenses, or create a more seamless customer experience, we’re continuing to invest in the data, intelligence, and platform capabilities that help you get there.
📣Interested in seeing any of these enhancements in action? Reply to this product newsletter or reach out to your ValidiFI contact to request a short walkthrough tailored to your current workflow.
