Multi-Layer Device Fingerprinting ™
Overview
Merchants often use affiliates and affiliate networks for marketing products and services. Unfortunately, affiliates can engage in fraudulent activity in order to "earn" commissions from the merchant without actually fulfilling their responsibility to direct valid customer traffic to the merchant's website and the desired product page. Sites that offer "free trials," or that require an application to be completed before the transaction can be submitted, are especially vulnerable to fraud due to the delay in the actual sale.
Strategy Management
Create and manage a fraud strategy based on your specific business needs.
Kount's Fraud Platform consist of the three main pillars of an overall fraud strategy, Fraud Detection, Strategy Management and Operational Management. Affiliate Monitoring is just one of the many features in Kount's comprehensive solution.
The Solution
There are multiple methods by which an affiliate can commit fraud against a merchant. The two most common include:
- Affiliates use automated programs ("click bots") to generate a large number of fraudulent clicks to collect illegitimate "pay-per-click" commissions.
- Affiliates use stolen credit cards to illegitimately "buy" products from the merchant—not with the idea of receiving the product but to collect fraudulent "pay-per-sale" commissions.
Kount's Affiliate Monitoring feature allows merchants to quickly identify fraudulent affiliate behavior prior to paying the commission for a "click" or "sale." The same technology that identifies when stolen credit cards are used by external customers can be used to detect an affiliate using a stolen credit card for a fraudulent "purchase." Since this occurs in real-time, the order can be rejected and the merchant can avoid paying a fraudulent commission to the affiliate.
If certain affiliates are deemed higher risks (but not found to have committed fraud), Kount allows a merchant to flag any orders associated with these suspected affiliates. These flagged transactions can then be routed for manual review by the merchant's risk assessment team.
If affiliates are identified as fraudsters, they can be banned from the affiliate network and Kount can subsequently identify any order activity generated by a banned affiliate to prevent fraudulent orders.