Equinox exposes fraud: Hargray deploys vendors offerings in triplicate

With revenue margins decreasing, carriers are seeking alternative defenses to combat financial losses. Hargray Communications is protecting itself from unnecessary expenses by adding three fraud detection devices.

The South Carolina-based carrier is deploying Equinox Information Systems' Collector, Protector Deluxe and ShowCDR Deluxe. Using the suite together, Hargray can detect potential fraud, and occasionally, disable fraudulent calls.

"Hargray wanted to provide a safety net for monitoring international traffic not terminated through [its] long-distance network," said David West, executive vice president of Equinox. "We worked with them to modify our software so that they could have different levels of scrutiny."

"We wanted to look specifically at different trunk groups by their carrier identification code and at third-party billing calls," added Joe Scruggs, chief engineer at Hargray.

Collector, an X.25 call detail record (CDR) collection system, transfers the records to the Protector, which uses rules-based technology to analyze usage. It will alert Hargray to suspect traffic such as high international traffic originating in certain areas. ShowCDR is a call record search utility system that lets Hargray analyze the CDRs in real time.

Hargray is part of a small percentage of carriers with detection systems. Although Equinox's purchasing orders have not increased significantly during the last few years, West has seen carriers' reasons for not purchasing the systems change.

"When we entered this business 13 years ago, most of the companies were bootstrap start-ups that did not take action until they experienced a significant financial loss," said West. "Now, the larger, more solvent carriers are focusing on getting customers on the network, and they worry about fraud and collection issues later."