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1 in 3 victims of an account compromise stopped doing business with the company or site

LOS ANGELES – November 16, 2016 – TeleSign today released its Consumer Account Security Report 2016, providing insight into consumer sentiments on online security and the value they place on their digital lives. Of the 1,300 U.S. consumers surveyed, nearly a third report the value of their online life at $100,000 to priceless. Further, more than half of the respondents surveyed (55 percent) place the onus on businesses as the party primarily responsible for providing for the security of their online and mobile accounts.

“When you consider what comprises an online life – email, banking and social media accounts, personal information, photos and more – these assets are extremely valuable, even ‘priceless’ as some reported,” said Aled Miles, TeleSign CEO. “With the majority of consumers looking to businesses to keep them safe online, companies need to prioritize providing strong account security or risk losing valuable users. In fact, our report shows 1 in 3 victims of account compromise stopped doing business with the impacted brand.”

More Than Half Experienced a Security Incident   

Fifty-one percent of consumers experienced a security incident in the past year, whether it was having an account hacked, password stolen, or their personal information compromised. This is in part due to a key finding of the Report that shows consumers continue to reuse passwords at an alarming rate. On average, consumers use the same password for seven online accounts – meaning that 71 percent of online accounts are protected by passwords that are used across multiple sites. Additionally, 46 percent of consumers use passwords that are older than five years.

These statistics are significant when considering the magnitude of consumer credentials flooding the market in 2016, which has already recorded the highest number of data breaches on record according to the Identity Theft Resource Center.[1] When credentials for one account are compromised, it creates a domino effect, essentially putting all other accounts protected with those same credentials at risk of cybercrime.

Millennials Prove Most Risky

Within key demographics, the Report found that millennials (ages 18 to 35) have the poorest security habits putting them at the highest risk for fraud. Overall, 64 percent of the millennials surveyed have had an account compromised, hacked, or their password stolen while less than half (44 percent) of all other generations combined have experienced the same. Millennials were also found to use fewer unique passwords to guard their accounts, with 35 percent using only 1 to 4 passwords, versus 25 percent for all other generations.

Awareness of Two-Factor Authentication (2FA) Increases

On the upside, consumers are making strides in adopting additional security beyond passwords.  Forty-six percent report ever enabling 2FA for any account, up from 39 percent in 2015, representing an 18 percent year-over-year increase. Further, of the 46 percent who have ever enabled 2FA, 77 percent turned it on for at least one new account in the past year. Interestingly, those that had at least one account compromised are almost twice as likely to enable 2FA as those who have not been victims of online fraud (60 percent vs. 32 percent).

Additional findings include:

• Eighty-two percent of consumers are concerned about online security with 88 percent concerned specifically about being hacked.
• Almost half (42%) of fraud victims say the security incidents resulted in losses.
• Only 12 percent of consumers are concerned about securing Internet of Things (“IoT”) devices, falling well behind concern for other accounts such as banking and finance accounts (87 percent) or email accounts (56 percent). This is notable in light of the recent attack targeting IoT devices, which according to experts, was the largest distributed denial of service (“DDoS”) attack on record.
• Nearly three in four (73 percent) consumers say forgetting their password is the most frustrating part of the account security process.

“With all the dangers we face today in our online lives, it’s encouraging to see that consumers are becoming increasingly aware of how to protect themselves beyond the password alone,” said Miles. “Seventy-three percent are urging companies to provide additional security such as 2FA. Turning it on is a step everyone can take today towards keeping their accounts secured and their online lives safe and private.”

Resource links:

• For full access to the TeleSign 2016 ‘Consumer Account Security Report,’ please visit: telesign.com/casr2016.
• To learn more about protecting online accounts, visit the Ultimate Guide to Two-Factor Authentication at turnon2fa.com.

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About TeleSign

TeleSign’s account security platform is trusted by the world’s largest brands to prevent online fraud. Combining real-time data & analytics, phone verification and two-factor authentication, TeleSign helps customers secure billions of end-user accounts from compromise. To find out more, visit http://www.telesign.com or follow us on Twitter – @TeleSign.

Research Methodology

TeleSign commissioned Lawless Research to design and conduct a study about consumer online and mobile account security. Between August 31 and September 5, 2016, 1,300 adults who have a mobile phone and at least one online account completed a 10-minute survey. The online survey was hosted by Qualtrics and Survey Sampling International provided respondents from their online panel. Tests of significant difference were conducted at the .01 level (99% probability that the difference is real, not by chance).

Media Contact

Sondra Magness

TeleSign

310.742.8252

smagness@telesign.com

[1] Identity Theft Resource Center 2016 Data Breaches http://www.idtheftcenter.org/Data-Breaches/

This study, commissioned by TeleSign and conducted by Lawless Research, benchmarks the status of consumer account security in the United States. The report describes consumers’ account security practices, their exposure to security incidents and their expectations for companies to protect their mobile and online accounts. Data are drawn from an online survey of 1,300 adults conducted in September 2016.

TeleSign Score, a Global Fraud Intelligence API, Now Harnesses the Power of Predictive Analytics to Verify End-Users

Los Angeles, CA – September 28, 2016 – TeleSign (www.telesign.com), today announced its commitment to the National Cyber Security Alliance’s “Lock Down Your Login” internet safety and security initiative to empower Americans to better protect their online accounts by moving beyond passwords. The campaign, which was announced by the White House in February 2016 as part of its Cybersecurity National Action Plan, calls for all Americans to fortify their online accounts by enabling the strongest authentication tools available so everyone can enjoy a greater peace of mind knowing their online accounts are more secure.

In 2015 alone, an estimated $15 billion was stolen from 13.1 million U.S. consumers due to identity fraud.1 Usernames and passwords simply are not enough to secure online accounts. While hackers and criminals continue to evolve their attack techniques, 72 percent of Americans still believe their accounts are secure with only a username and password.2 Millions of Americans have had their online accounts hacked because of stolen credentials or weak logins, but many are either unaware or not using widely available, simple technologies to better secure their online accounts. With the most common passwords in the country remaining 123456 and 123456789, this false sense of confidence is leaving the door open to hackers looking to steal identities and valuable personal information.

Responding to the challenge, the “Lock Down Your Login” campaign was created to help Americans minimize personal risk to cybercrime by educating and empowering them to better protect their key social media, email and bank accounts by enabling strong authentication – sometimes called multi-factor, two-factor or login approval. While no security measure is foolproof, a few easy steps – such as using a separate small device you have in your possession, verifying identity via biometrics like voice, facial recognition, fingerprint or iris-scan or by using a unique one-time code through an app on your mobile device – can make it much harder for hackers to disrupt our digital daily lives. Implementing strong authentication ensures it’s actually the user trying to access the account and not just someone with the correct password tying to log in which can alleviate some of the worry about being online.

“TeleSign research shows that the password is failing us. More than half of Americans experienced an online security incident in the past year, and hackers are making quick work of accounts protected by passwords alone,” said Aled Miles, CEO at TeleSign. “At TeleSign, we provide account security solutions to many of the world’s largest brands and have seen firsthand the power of two-factor authentication (2FA) to protect consumer accounts beyond the password and stop a significant amount of online fraud. We are a proud partner of the White House’s ‘Lock Down Your Login’ campaign and look forward to helping raise awareness for this vitally important security step.”

The “Lock Down Your Login” campaign is a STOP. THINK. CONNECT.™ initiative built upon a broad, coordinated effort to increase consumer awareness of our individual and collective roles in cybersecurity. It brings together dozens of industry leaders and like-minded organizations that understand the importance of cybersecurity awareness and education.

“We live in a digital age where people, networks and devices are increasingly interconnected, and the more internet users who enable strong authentication, the safer we will all be online,” said Michael Kaiser, NCSA’s executive director.  “We are thankful to our ‘Lock Down Your Login’ sponsors and partner organizations for their support and commitment to our shared responsibility of promoting cybersecurity and helping to create a safer, more secure and trusted internet.”

To learn how to make your online accounts as secure as possible with strong authentication and to become a partner, please visit www.lockdownyourlogin.com.

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About TeleSign

TeleSign’s account security platform is trusted by the world’s largest brands to prevent online fraud. Combining real-time data & analytics, phone verification and two-factor authentication, TeleSign helps customers secure billions of end-user accounts from compromise. To find out more, visit http://www.telesign.com or follow us on Twitter – @TeleSign.

About the “Lock Down Your Login” Campaign

The “Lock Down Your Login” campaign, a key public-facing pillar of the multifaceted Cybersecurity National Action Plan (CNAP) announced by the White House in February 2016, is a STOP. THINK. CONNECT.™ initiative led by the National Cyber Security Alliance and developed by a coalition of industry leaders and like-minded organizations working in collaboration with government, who understand the importance of cybersecurity awareness and education. The campaign was built upon a broad, coordinated effort to increase consumer awareness of our individual and collective roles in cybersecurity. The campaign’s sponsors include CompTIA, Google, Javelin Strategy & Research, Mastercard, mcgarrybowen, Mozilla Foundation, PayPal, TeleSign, True Key™ by Intel Security, Twitter Inc., Visa Inc. and. Wells Fargo & Company. Learn more about our partners and how to get involved at LockDownYourLogin.com.

Companies to operate independently, with TeleSign a subsidiary of BICS

Brussels, October 31st 2017 – BICS, a global provider of international wholesale connectivity and interoperability services, today announced it has closed the acquisition of TeleSign, following the April 25th announcement of entering a definitive agreement to acquire the US-based CPaaS company for $230M. The closing of the acquisition creates the world’s first end-to-end CPaaS provider, bridging the market leading TeleSign cloud communications platform with one of the largest global carriers in the world.

TeleSign will continue to operate independently as a wholly-owned subsidiary of BICS with the brand name TeleSign. The company also continues under the leadership of CEO Aled Miles, and adds Daniel Kurgan, CEO of BICS, as the Chairman of the Board.

“We are pleased to have brought the TeleSign acquisition to completion and enthusiastic to add TeleSign’s deep pool of talent and expertise to the BICS family. This complementary combination accelerates several of our strategies for growth, including expanding our customer base, regional reach and product innovation. We have also broadened our expertise within the cloud communications development lifecycle, and will build and grow TeleSign’s established strong position in the fast-growing CPaaS and cloud security markets”, stated Daniel Kurgan, CEO of BICS and Chairman of TeleSign.

TeleSign has built a strong business in mobile identity, account security and cloud communication solutions and has been the trusted partner to the world’s top internet brands or mobile applications looking to engage and secure end-users. The acquisition strengthens TeleSign’s push into the high-growth communications platform as a service market. In a recent report, IDC forecasts the worldwide voice and text messaging communications platform-as-a-service market to grow from $867 million in 2016 to $8.2 billion in 2021.

“We’re powering a fundamental change in the way businesses engage their users. Our platform enables developers to add real-time communications and security into their applications without the need for complex backend infrastructure. Now backed by BICS’ extensive global network and its direct reach to over 700 mobile and fixed operators worldwide – TeleSign’s trusted platform is in a class by itself in terms of global reach, network reliability and overall quality of service,” said Aled Miles, CEO of TeleSign.

As businesses of all sizes and sectors embrace cloud communications to create innovative new services and transform how they communicate with their customers, this acquisition creates a clear leader in the field to help them achieve their goals. BICS and TeleSign will move forward focused on their respective core businesses while benefiting from immediate and future synergies in areas such as jointly investing in accelerating product roadmaps to speed up time to market and leveraging rich data reservoirs to enrich product offerings.

Ends

ABOUT TELESIGN
TeleSign is a communications platform as a service (CPaaS) company, founded on security. Since 2005, TeleSign has been a trusted partner to 20 of the top 25 global websites and mobile applications, helping secure billions of end-user accounts. Today, TeleSign’s data-driven, cloud communications platform is changing the way businesses engage with customers and prevent fraud.

Find out more on www.telesign.com and follow us @TeleSign for more information.

ABOUT BICS
As a leading international communications enabler, BICS is connecting the world by creating reliable and secure mobile experiences anytime, anywhere. We are a global voice carrier and the leading provider of mobile data services worldwide. Our solutions are essential for supporting the modern lifestyle of today’s device-hungry consumer – from global mobile connectivity, seamless roaming experiences, fraud prevention and authentication, to global messaging and the Internet of Things. We are headquartered in Brussels, with a strong presence in Africa, Americas, Asia, Europe and Middle East.

For more information visit www.bics.com and follow our tweets @BICS_SA

MEDIA CONTACTS

Los Angeles, CA – October 6, 2016 – TeleSign, the leader in mobile identity solutions, today announced the addition of machine learning and other key features to its industry-leading fraud intelligence solution, TeleSign Score. TeleSign Score enables companies to achieve greater identity assurance, protect brand reputation and effectively grow user bases. With 86% of companies extremely or very concerned about authenticating the identity of their users (TeleSign 2016 ‘Beyond the Password’ Report), this first-of-its-kind fusion of machine learning and phone number data further increases the effectiveness and accuracy of predicting and scoring online user risk.

TeleSign Score is a powerful risk assessment API that delivers reputational scoring based on phone number intelligence, traffic patterns, machine learning and a global data consortium to web and mobile-based applications around the world. Now with the addition of machine learning, TeleSign Score is able to use historical indicators to uncover hidden insights and predict fraudulent activity. Score is customizable by customer, industry or specific use case, enabling companies to proactively identify fraud while streamlining the user experience for legitimate users.

“With 90 percent of companies experiencing online fraud in the past year, finding ways to proactively block fraudsters has become an increasingly vital component of every online fraud prevention strategy,” said Aled Miles, CEO at TeleSign. “The advances we’re making using machine learning within TeleSign Score are helping our customers uncover hidden insights and predict, prevent and respond to fraud in real-time.”

“Everything we do is based on our ability to ensure our renters and landlords are who they say they are,” said Jonathan Eppers, CEO of RadPad.  “Integrating TeleSign Score has helped our brand reduce fraudsters’ chances of creating multiple fake accounts and disrupting the genuine user experience. TeleSign Score has not only helped us streamline the account registration process, we’ve also increased conversions and securely grown our user base with verified users.”

Easily integrated into existing account security workflows, TeleSign Score helps companies combat a variety of high-impact fraud use cases including account takeovers, phishing attacks, fake account registrations and more. Through TeleSign’s deep relationships with mobile network operators, TeleSign Score is able to analyze massive volumes of real-time and historical data on phone number usage and then feed this information into customer-specific machine learning algorithms to provide a risk score and recommended response for each new user. Complete with customizable, pre-set response actions, the end result is a brand and user-base that is safer, more authentic and more valuable.

Key feature upgrades to TeleSign Score include:

• Machine Learning: A customizable, data analysis technique that trains TeleSign’s proprietary algorithm to uncover hidden insights in phone number data to populate a range of predictors for both good and bad phone numbers.
• Labeled Data Analysis: The ability to analyze company-provided labeled data – a list of phone numbers specific to their fraud situation/industry/use case that have been identified as either good or bad – to develop a machine learning model that identifies and predicts fraud in Score transactions.
• Additional customer-submitted trust anchors: Companies can submit additional data objects – email address, account ID, and device ID. These unique data points are correlated to a phone number or transaction, making Score even more effective.
• New IP Address Rules: Companies can also submit a user’s originating IP address associated with the Score transaction to provide insight into the user’s location. Rules can be applied based on customer requests that impact the determination of the risk assessment score.

The TeleSign Score API for web and mobile applications is available today around the globe and can be easily embedded into new or existing app-based platforms.

Learn more about TeleSign Score and get full product details by visiting: https://www.telesign.com/products/score/.

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About TeleSign

TeleSign’s account security platform is trusted by the world’s largest brands to prevent online fraud. Combining real-time data & analytics, phone verification and two-factor authentication, TeleSign helps customers secure billions of end-user accounts from compromise. To find out more, visit http://www.telesign.com or follow us on Twitter – @TeleSign.

Media Contact

Eric Lammerding

TeleSign

310.740.9676

elammerding@telesign.com

Security pros name behavioral biometrics and two-factor authentication (2FA)  as leading strategies to address deficiencies in password-only account security.

Los Angeles, June 29, 2016 – TeleSign, the leader in mobile identity solutions, today released a new report Beyond the Password: The Future of Account Security. The study found that 69 percent of security professionals believe usernames and passwords alone no longer provide sufficient security and a majority (72 percent) predict passwords will be phased out within nine years. The report also shows that security professionals are increasingly turning to effective, easy to implement technologies such as behavioral biometrics and two-factor authentication (2FA) to secure user accounts.

“The vast majority of security professionals no longer trust the password to do its job,” said Ryan Disraeli, Co-Founder of TeleSign. “Thankfully, most companies aren’t resigning themselves or their users to password-only account security. They are implementing two-factor authentication in droves and newer technologies such as behavioral biometrics are emerging to address many of the concerns developers have around adding new tech to their applications.”

More key findings from TeleSign’s The Future of Account Security Report include:

• Trust in passwords is waning, most companies plan to do away with them
  • Sixty-nine percent of security professionals believe usernames and passwords alone no longer provide sufficient security
  • Seventy-two percent believe their company will do away with passwords by 2025.
• Poor security can lead to increases in fraud, having multiple impacts
  • Ninety percent of companies experienced fraud in the past 12 months, of which 97 percent felt the impacts.
  • Seventy-nine percent are extremely or very concerned about account takeovers (ATOs), and with good reason. Costs were higher for companies who had experienced ATOs in the past year — with 51 percent experiencing financial losses, 42 percent experiencing loss of customers or users, 42 percent experiencing damage to the company brand and 45 percent experiencing increased employee time to correct the fraud.
• Behavioral biometrics and 2FA increase account security and are on the rise
  • Nine in 10 companies say behavioral biometrics would be extremely or very valuable for increasing security and 8 in 10 say it would increase security without degrading the user experience.
  • More than half of companies (54 percent) plan to implement behavioral biometrics in 2016 or later.
  • Eighty-five percent of companies will be using 2FA within the next 12 months, with four in ten already using it for their consumer accounts and another four in ten planning to adopt it in the next year.
  • Ninety-two percent of security pros agree two-factor authentication significantly increases account security on top of passwords.

Online fraud remains a top concern for companies, with 86 percent reporting they are extremely or very concerned about authenticating the identity of web and mobile app users. In the past year, 9 in 10 companies have experienced fraud and almost 8 in 10 (79 percent) are concerned about account takeovers (ATOs). ATOs occur when unauthorized access is gained to a web or mobile end-user account – often due to stolen credentials, weak passwords or bot-based attacks. Overall, the impact of fraud remains high, with 42 percent of companies saying they experienced financial losses and 45 percent experiencing increased employee time to correct the fraud.

“The business of fraud has become public enemy number one for mobile and online companies,” Disraeli continued. “Cybercrime such as account takeover is affecting businesses of all sizes by incurring financial losses, loss of customers and users and ultimately brand damage. In order to address the failing password, enterprises need to add additional account security technologies to keep user accounts safe. Behavioral biometrics technology and two-factor authentication are emerging as leading candidates to bridge the gap.”

Commissioned by TeleSign and conducted by Lawless Research, the study surveyed 600 security professionals across 15 industries in the U.S. and revealed that securing consumer accounts is a top concern for businesses.

Additional resources:

The Future of Account Security Report: https://www.telesign.com/resources/research-and-reports/beyond-password-future-account-security/

The Future of Account Security Infographic: https://www.telesign.com/resources/infographics/future-account-security-report-infographic

HPE, Cisco, Symantec Veteran Joins Company to Lead Product Strategy and Innovation

Los Angeles, CA – December 13, 2016 – TeleSign today announced it has hired security and software veteran Tom Powledge as Chief Product Officer, reporting directly to CEO Aled Miles. In this newly created role, he is responsible for overseeing product strategy and management at TeleSign.

“As TeleSign enters its next phase of growth, we are pleased to add such a talented visionary to the team,” said Miles. “Tom brings a depth of experience to TeleSign that we’re looking forward to leveraging as we continue to enable the world’s largest brands predict and prevent fraud.”

Powledge comes to TeleSign from Hewlett Packard Enterprise (HPE) where he was the Vice President and General Manager for ArcSign, a $350M business in the Software Division. In this role, Powledge was responsible for strategy, product management, business development and engineering of HPE’s security information and event management product.

Prior to HPE, Powledge was Vice President of Managed Security Services at Cisco Systems, where he led all aspects of service development and delivery for the team that provides advanced threat detection and security management to enterprises around the globe.

In addition to his experience at HPE and Cisco Systems, Powledge spent 20 years as part of Symantec’s leadership team, where he last served as Vice President of the Information Security Group, responsible for the company’s $1.2B information security product portfolio and managed services.

“I am thrilled to join a tremendous team at such a pivotal time in the company’s growth,” said Powledge. “I look forward to helping TeleSign extend its sophisticated platform beyond its unique position as the world’s leading provider of user account verification.”

Powledge is a graduate of the Harvard Business School General Management Program and the University of California Santa Barbara.

To learn more about TeleSign, please visit www.telesign.com.

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About TeleSign

TeleSign’s account security platform is trusted by the world’s largest brands to prevent online fraud. Combining real-time data & analytics, phone verification and two-factor authentication, TeleSign helps customers secure billions of end-user accounts from compromise. To find out more, visit http://www.telesign.com or follow us on Twitter – @TeleSign.

Media Contact

Sondra Magness, TeleSign

310.742.8252

smagness@telesign.com

Commissioned by TeleSign and conducted by Lawless Research, “The Future of Account Security” report surveyed 600 security professionals across 15 industries in the U.S. and revealed that securing consumer accounts is a top concern for businesses.

Key findings include:

• Trust in passwords is waning, most companies plan to do away with them
• Poor security can lead to increases in fraud, having multiple impacts
• Behavioral biometrics and 2FA increase account security and are on the rise