It can now take as little as 9 minutes for stolen card and account data to be used via the dark web. With this in mind, Mastercard today announced the launch of Early Detection System, a new service that provides banks with a unique advanced alert for high-risk cards and accounts that are exposed in security incidents or data breaches.

Just last month, 143 million identities were reported as compromised in one data breach. Knowing that not all compromised accounts will be used fraudulently, and every second counts, Mastercard developed Early Detection System to help banks take action faster, and pre-empt more serious attacks.

Using Mastercard network insights, predictive capabilities and a combination of internal and external data sources, Early Detection System determines if a card or account is at risk and sends an alert to the relevant bank, quantifying the level of risk. The bank then uses the level of risk to more accurately prioritise what action to take – from monitoring transactions more closely to proactively issuing a replacement card.

“Knowledge is power, and this service helps banks act significantly faster and with greater precision to stop potential fraud before it occurs,” said Ajay Bhalla, president of enterprise risk and security at Mastercard. “Our card issuers can now proactively target the fraudulent activity resulting from previously breached or hacked data, helping them reduce costs and maintain the best possible cardholder experience.”

Early Detection System is available to issuers globally and captures all types of fraud across all transaction channels. The system identifies everything from active criminal trading of account data, to identification of cards being tested prior to being used for fraud, to account data that appears at-risk but without sufficient evidence to declare an Account Data Compromise event. This provides issuers with alerts on a much broader set of at-risk accounts at least 6 to 18 months ahead of traditional alerts.

Part of Security by Design

Mastercard has a long history of investing and innovating across multiple layers of technology – like EMV, tokenisation, physical and behavioural biometrics, and artificial intelligence – to protect every transaction.