Age verification, a critical tool in safeguarding the young and preventing fraud

When the UK suddenly became far more reliant on digital networks for work and life at the start of the pandemic, fraudsters saw an opportunity to double down on their efforts. This surge of bad actor behaviour left businesses and regulatory bodies working hard to combat the growing risk — and that mission hasn’t slowed ever since.

Age verification regulations are one of the key strategies being employed to prevent fraud in 2022 and beyond. In this blog we're going to take a look at what these regulations are, why they're important, and how JT is uniquely poised to help your business comply with them.

What are age verification regulations?

No doubt you’ll have come across age verification regulations before. When it comes to vaping, alcohol usage, gambling, and viewing adult content, there are age restrictions in place.

These controls are in place so that only people of a certain age can access certain products, services, and substances. Unfortunately, proving someone's age can be difficult, especially if you are trying to do so over the internet.

These laws (and their challenges) can affect businesses in a variety of sectors, and if a business is found to be violating them (even accidentally), then the consequences can be severe.

Why is age verification important?

Below, we've listed just a few reasons to give you an idea of why these restrictions matter

Age verification requirements prevent access to age restricted content

For one thing, age verification regulations act as a form of identity confirmation. You can compare someone's claimed age or date of birth against known data to help corroborate their identity.

This is already commonplace in most financial institutions and can go a long way towards preventing fraud in other areas as well. However, to make this possible, businesses will need access to data on each individual's age, but we'll cover that in more detail further in this blog.

For now, it's important to know that verifying someone's age is an important step in verifying their identity.

Age verification helps mitigate the growing risk of fraud

Not only can age verification confirm a customer’s identity, but companies can then use that verification in the fight against fraud. The process helps establish if a person is who they claim to be, and serve as an additional source of information before granting access to sensitive data.

While not comprehensive on its own, age verification can act as another important piece in the puzzle when it comes to keeping individuals' accounts secure.

Age verification keeps underage individuals safe

Lastly and most importantly, age verification can keep underage individuals safe. This is the primary reason that age verification regulations exist in the first place, and it remains the most important role for this safety check to play.

Being exposed to inappropriate and harmful content and products can, and does have negative impacts on vulnerable adolescent minds, and exposes them to harm from bad actors.

By complying with age verification regulations, your business can play a key role in keeping young people safe.

How JT can help with age verification regulations

While maintaining compliance with age verification regulations can be a challenge, it's not a challenge that you have to tackle on your own. JT has the data and tools to support you in keeping individuals safe, verified, and inside of the law. Here's how.

Mapping mobile phone users to their account details

First, JT can help you map mobile phone users to their account details. That means we can look at a person's phone number, check the associated account, and provide you with verified information on that person's age. This is a fast and simple way to put your business in touch with a reliable database.

JT KYC is built to secure your customer knowledge

Next, JT offers a KYC (Know Your Customer) service that can secure your customer knowledge. KYC plays a crucial part in protecting subscribers from fraud, and JT's KYC solution is fast, efficient, and secure.

Build trust among your customers with a privacy compliant framework

JT can help you cultivate trust among your customers by providing you with a robust privacy-compliant framework from a partner specialising in fraud protection and identity verification.