• Arkose Labs introduced new detection and alert capabilities against advanced phishing attacks.
• The new capabilities combat an evolution in phishing called “reverse proxy phishing.”
• Arkose Labs won Best of Show in its Finovate debut at FinovateSpring in 2019.

Bot detection specialist Arkose Labs now detects and alerts against advanced phishing attacks. The new functionality combats “reverse proxy phishing,” the latest evolution in the challenge of dealing with fraudsters and cybercriminals.

“Phishing isn’t simply about domain block lists or analyzing website contents anymore,” Arkose Labs CTO Ashish Jain said. “Those methods might work against unsophisticated attacks, but new phishing attacks require a comprehensive security posture.”

Reverse proxy attacks use fake websites to impersonate legitimate websites. Bank websites are a common target. In the process, users are encouraged to visit the fake website via a message and are asked to login. The fake website then sends the user’s information to the server of the real web site. This causes the real website to issue a one-time password (OTP) or security PIN. The fraudster can then leverage the proxy to extract user credentials, including the OTP or PIN. The attacker can also secure the cookie from the legitimate website. This enables the cybercriminal to access the user’s account.

“Arkose Bot Manager beats attackers at their own game by forcing them to integrate Arkose into their fake pages with absolutely no effect on the user experience,” Jain added. “With Arkose integrated, we can thwart a phishing attack and give the business data on the attackers – and unlike traditional phishing detection methods, Arkose Phishing Protection is able to detect and block malicious requests in real-time.”

Arkose Labs’ new advanced phishing protection comes as the company announced a new anti-fraud guarantee against SMS toll fraud attacks. The warranty covers up to one million dollars in telecom expenses if Arkose Bot Manager fails to stop an SMS toll fraud attack against one of its managed service customers.

SMS toll fraud is a type of bot attack in which large volumes of SMS messages are sent to premium rate numbers. Also known as SMS pumping or International Revenue Share Fraud (IRSF), this attack can result in sizable fraudulent SMS charges against a business. In some cases, the charges can amount to millions of dollars a month.

“This type of attack hits a company right in the wallet,” Arkose Labs CFO Frank Teruel said. “We stand confident in our platform, and Arkose already has saved customers millions in fraudulent SMS charges by stopping these attacks. Frankly, this type of warranty should be table stakes for any security vendor.”

Founded in 2017, Arkose Labs is headquartered in San Francisco, California. The company won Best of Show in its Finovate debut at FinovateSpring 2019. Arkose Labs returned to the Finovate stage two years later for FinovateFall in New York. Kevin Gosschalk is founder and CEO.

Photo by Noelle Otto

• Arkose Labs launched its new fraud detection solution, Arkose Detect.
• The new offering was formerly an embedded component of the company’s Arkose Protect technology.
• Arkose Labs won Best of Show at its Finovate debut at FinovateSpring 2019.

A new fraud detection solution from Arkose Labs called Arkose Detect will help prevent fraud attacks on consumer accounts as well as help businesses boost revenue by providing legitimate users with a seamless customer experience.

“Every company today is operating in the ‘decision economy,’ which is stimulated and fueled by data,” Arkose Labs Chief Product Officer Ashish Jain said. “We designed Arkose Detect to leverage the collective data from the world’s biggest companies so that those hard-to-suss-out fraud attacks can be easily detected. As fraud is constantly evolving, we have an ambitious product roadmap and will continue to innovate to stay ahead of threats.”

Arkose Detect was previously an embedded component of the company’s dynamic attack response solution, Arkose Protect. Now, in the wake of testing with major international businesses, Arkose Detect is being rolled out as its own product. Arkose Detect leverages AI to force fraudsters and cybercriminals to become increasingly sophisticated in their attacks. This raises the cost of their attacks against businesses defended with Arkose Detect, incentivizing fraudsters to go elsewhere.

Additionally, the new solution gives customers a risk score that allows them to adjust their own fraud models to better detect both automated, malicious bots as well as human-driven fraud attacks. Arkose Labs will also share the fraud data collected and analyzed by Arkose Detect with its customers in order to enable them to enhance their internal fraud prevention processes. Arkose Detect features more than 70 raw risk signals and more than 150 pre-built insights culled from Arkose Labs’ global network.

“In just six years, Arkose Labs has grown to boast a portfolio of category-leading customers across financial services, gaming, travel, ecommerce/retail, social media, and technology industries,” Arkose CEO and founder Kevin Gosschalk said. “And this is just an early chapter in our growth story. Our forecasted trajectory is exciting and attracting attention due to the efficiency of our core technology, on which Arkose Detect is built.”

A Finovate alum since its Best of Show-winning demo at FinovateSpring in 2019, Arkose Labs has since partnered with Bugcrowd to launch a private bug bounty program, introduced the industry’s first warranty against credential stuffing attacks, and unveiled a range of “significant updates” to its fraud detection platform including the development of Arkose Enforce, Arkose Insights, and Arkose Detect.

“The latest product enhancements include detection capabilities which are adapted to a world where attackers are spoofing devices and other identifying information,” Jain said when the updates were announced in October. “Customers also have easier access to the multi-layered risk insights that we use in our machine learning-powered decision engine.”

Headquartered in San Francisco, California, Arkose Labs was founded in 2015. The company has raised more than $106 million in funding from investors including the SoftBank Vision Fund 2, M12 – Microsoft’s Venture Fund, and the Sony Innovation Fund, among others.

Photo by Rodolfo Clix