TMCnet Feature

The world of fraud detection is a growing one as the mobile element enters the workforce in companies of all sizes, and businesses continue to expand on global levels. The notion of how best to protect one’s data may be different in the eyes of different providers, but one makes its way through the crowd to command the forefront of the security question.

Humbug has been a service popular with many businesses as it provides call analytics and fraud detection. The original Humbug was a free service that ran up until December of last year, and, to date, the call analytics service is still free. The fraud detection – a service that Humbug is making considerable upgrades to, is now available from the SMB through to the enterprise. I had a chance to sit down with Eric Klein, VP of Sales and Marketing for Humbug, at ITEXPO (News - Alert) East 2012 in Miami this week to gain some insight into the fraud detection market and the progress Humbug is making in its new version of its successful software.

Most fraud happens on holidays, nights, and weekends, when businesses are closed. “This software enables you to black list certain times of day when you do not allow calls to go through,” said Klein. He told me that the software now provides a “white list” which can include members of the support team that are able to make calls during black-listed times. “You can block countries, except for a select few control on making calls. The large providers such as AT&T (News - Alert) and Verizon do not know the small business. We let you, as the owner of the switch, control the black and white lists,” added Klein.

By proactively preventing fraudulent calls, Humbug version 3.0 Silver Hawk allows the end-user to configure his PBX (News - Alert) to block calls to fraudulent destinations based on certain parameters including premium worldwide numbers, by business hours, or countries.

Prominent organizations are already using Humbug’s Pro, Fonality (News - Alert) being one of them. In a release, Rahim Jina, head of information security at Fonality, said, "Preventing fraud to protect our customers is one of our top priorities and we are constantly seeking innovative solutions to support this objective. Humbug offers a reliable, cost-effective service and we are excited about the new release. The reporting functionality, which has potential to be used across the organization, is particularly beneficial. Plus, the new proactive fraud prevention adds powerful features to their core product."

Juliana Kenny graduated from the University of Connecticut with a double degree in English and French. After managing a small company for two years, she joined TMC (News - Alert) as a Web Editor for TMCnet. Juliana currently focuses on the call center and CRM industries, but she also writes about cloud telephony and network gear including softswitches.

Edited by Juliana Kenny