BioCatch Unveils New Mule Account Detection Tool

BioCatch is trying to thwart cybercriminals that move money through mule accounts. The company has previously warned that mule traffic increased during the COVID-19 pandemic, as fraudsters sought to take advantage of people who found themselves in precarious financial situations.

Now BioCatch has released a new Mule Account Detection tool that was built specifically to help financial institutions identify mule activity. The solution is a behavioral biometrics offering that runs continuously in the background to watch for patterns that have been linked to mule activity in the past, both during account creation and during live sessions after an account has been set up.

In that regard, the tool is robust enough to spot accounts that have been set up with synthetic identities, and accounts that belong to real people who have agreed to participate in a mule scheme. People in the latter group typically allow cybercriminals to move funds through their accounts in exchange for a small portion of the profits. In doing so, they help cybercriminals launder money that was originally obtained through illicit means.

BioCatch noted that financial institutions that do not stop money mules could run afoul of Anti-Money Laundering regulations, or suffer reputational damage to their businesses. Cybercriminals often try to recruit younger individuals with less financial savvy, which is why the number of mule accounts belonging to people under the age of 21 went up 78 percent over the course of the past year. Many fraudsters targeted government stimulus programs during the pandemic, prompting financial institutions to take a greater interest in mule prevention.

“The issue of mule account detection is complex because there are many different scenarios at play,” said BioCatch CEO Gadi Mazor. “BioCatch Mule Account Detection applies machine learning risk models to look for the unique behaviors associated with multiple fraud scenarios indicative of mule activity at both the account opening and the point of payment.”

BioCatch predicted that mule accounts would be a major priority for financial institutions in 2021. The company will discuss its new Mule Account Detection solution and the five most common mule personas during a free webinar on December 1.

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November 23, 2021 – by Eric Weiss