New Wire Fraud Prevention Tool Launches

CertifID, a leader in wire fraud protection, launched PayoffProtect, which gives title, escrow and settlement companies peace of mind by preventing property loan payoffs from being sent to fraudsters. Also, Minneapolis-based growth equity firm Arthur Ventures led a $12.5 million series A round in CertifID. Arthur Ventures is known for leading investments in high-growth, capital-efficient business-to-business software companies. 

The new PayoffProtect solution combines CertifID’s expert knowledge and suite of intellectual property. The latter includes machine learning capabilities that are now being leveraged to automate and standardize the mortgage payoff demand letter verification process. In more than 95% of cases, the company’s validation engine software authenticates loan payoff wiring instructions. 

Developed as a result of CertifID’s intrapreneurial culture, PayoffProtect is designed in response to customer feedback about an unaddressed area of vulnerability for real estate wire transfers. The problem PayoffProtect addresses is the sharp increase in fraud surrounding wire transfers made from title companies to lenders in connection with mortgage payoffs. These scams involve fraudsters impersonating the mortgage lender as part of a real estate closing, in hopes of having the payoff wire transfer redirected to the fraudster’s bank account. 

“We’ve helped recover nearly $50 million in loan payoff fraud, and now we have the solution to prevent it,” said Tyler Adams, CEO of CertifID. “For large sum loans such as mortgages, payoff wiring instructions verification has remained a laborious and vulnerable process. Thanks to PayoffProtect, the days of mortgage payoff fraud are finally over.”  

PayoffProtect is coming out of a beta period where it’s already being used with great success by customers including Knight Barry Title, Continental Title Company and Bluegrass Land Title. Before PayoffProtect, these industry professionals were left with no other recourse but to complete mortgage payoff demand letter statements manually, and then make countless phone calls to confirm bank wiring information and ensure insurance compliance before sending a loan payoff wire transfer. 

“Verification by phone is frustrating, time-consuming and oftentimes comes to a dead end,” said Rachel Petrach, Chief Closing & Compliance Officer at Knight Barry Title. “PayoffProtect allows us to feel comfortable, allows us to sleep better at night, and hopefully reduces a bit of the gray tint in my hair.” 

“I absolutely love PayoffProtect,” said Jessica Tweedy, Accounting Controller at Continental Title Company. “It’s the easiest product that’s come about. I have my whole week done in a matter of minutes.” 

PayoffProtect is the newest product featured in the CertifID SaaS platform, which is integrated with the leading title production software systems, and allows busy title and escrow operators to eliminate time-consuming, manual processes from their workflow.