How to Prevent Credential Fraud

Intro

In today's competitive world, it’s almost impossible for a recruiter or an institution not to encounter any fake documents or claims inside a CV. As per a study conducted in 2018 by the Florian Mantione Institute, up to 65% of resumes contain misleading claims. Therefore both institutions and recruiters became very careful when assessing people who applied to some school or job that they want to join. 

With the rise in credential fraud each year, various solutions have been attempted to address the issue. One solution created was online credentialing platforms. These platforms can issue and distribute all kinds of microcredentials for their customers, making awarded certificates verifiable. As a result, recruiters can now evaluate individuals based on verifiable documents and be confident in their skills and expertise.

What is credential fraud?

Credential fraud involves falsifying certificates and presenting dishonest qualifications, skills, or experience that one does not possess. This action is often done to gain an unfair advantage in professional or academic settings. Credential fraud can be done in many ways. The most popular credential fraud form is simply presenting fake certifications or degrees. Other forms include exaggerating their roles and buying degrees from unaccredited diploma mills. Any credential form is illegal and, if noticed by a recruiter, will substantially impact one’s professional career.

The current digitized world simplifies the process of credentialing fraud. The tools and resources to create, alter, and distribute fraudulent credentials have become easy to access. Many free graphic editing tools allow for the creation of realistic-looking certificates and degrees with minimal effort. Furthermore, there are online platforms that are directly offering pre-made fake documents. While technology has brought us great convenience and innovation, it has also, unfortunately, made it easier for deceit to happen. As a result, it became straightforward for people to dishonestly create or buy fake documents and use them to gain an advantage over their competitors when applying to a job or an educational institution. 

Conclusion

As we mentioned above, credentialing fraud is straightforward to commit. Therefore, methods for its detection have simultaneously evolved. Companies and educational institutions are investing in verification systems that can verify a certificate's authenticity and degrees against original issuing databases. These modern organizations already started to invest tons of capital to verify any documents' originality via third-party Saas companies as well as verification agencies. These agencies and companies are offering services that can quickly and accurately determine the validity of an individual's credentials. Furthermore, innovative technologies such as blockchain have entered the industry, offering an immutable record that ensures digital certificates are transparent. Moreover, artificial intelligence and machine learning algorithms are also being used from time to time to analyze patterns, spot anomalies, and automatically flag suspicious credentials. As fraudulent companies use similar programs and algorithms to generate these fake documents, machine learning systems can train themselves and spot these counterfeit documents. However, most of the time, they won’t provide 100% correct results. Ultimately, with these advances, while the task of detecting fraud remains challenging, it has become significantly more manageable and efficient.