Getting Started | Kount Fraud Manager

Table of Contents

1. What is Kount Fraud Manager?
2. Features and Benefits
3. How does Kount work?
4. What Gateway Products and Features does Kount work with?
5. Enabling Service
6. Kount Score

What is Kount Fraud Manager?

Kount Fraud Management is an industry leading, AI-driven fraud prevention for eCommerce, mCommerce, and card-not-present transactions. Kount is unique in that its adaptive AI uses a combination of supervised and unsupervised machine learning, to provide real-time risk analysis and fraud assessment. 

Features and Benefits

• Kount owns and controls the entire technical stack, which is purpose-built for enterprise-grade fraud management.
• Fed by global data - Over 30 billion transactions reviewed annually, collecting hundreds of variables on every transaction, contextualizing and creating data unique to each merchant.
• Intelligence - Leveraging two types of proprietary AI/Machine Learning that work immediately to provide accurate Omniscore, Persona, and Fraud scores in real-time.
• The Kount section within the NMI merchant portal provides a simple 3-way status for each transaction; Approved, Declined, and Needs Review.
• Frictionless transaction journey leads to enhanced customer satisfaction (CSAT).
• Fewer false positives increase sales conversion rate, for less abandonment. 
• Improved customer retention and lifetime value, to maximize your brand reputation.

How does Kount work?

When Kount is turned on, it immediately starts working without any configuration on the merchants part. Merchant using Kount will have the base level configuration set by default. Merchants can customize their own settings to suit their specific risk in their Threshold Management settings if they like.

Kount utilizes a global database and AI-driven comprehensive fraud screening toolset. They also require usage of what’s called a Data Collector which provides several additional points for their AI Fraud Scrubber to consider when deciding what constitutes as ‘fraud’ and what deserves a higher score. There are no settings to configure and as long as the merchant is using one of our hosted payment features, or is using the Gateway.js product for their third party website, there is no further configuration necessary.

• The device Data Collector is only meant to be used for consumer facing payment pages, not merchant initiated ones (Virtual Terminal, Batch Upload), so that the merchant’s location and other details do not get mixed up with the customer’s during the fraud screening.

Merchants who are processing using the Virtual Terminal, Batch Upload, or other services that are more “merchant initiated” can still make use of Kount (more details below).

What Gateway Products and Features does Kount work with?

Collect Checkout - Kount's Data Collector is supported in Collect Checkout. Merchants using Collect Checkout can enable Kount and the Data Collector will start functioning in Collect Checkout with no additional development or settings. 

Collect.js - when using Collect.js on your own checkout pages, integrators will need to pair this system with the Gateway.js product to make use of the Data Collector. Integrators will need to integrate to Gateway.js and pass a new variable for the session ID to the gateway on every transaction they wish Kount to function on.

QuickClick - Kount's Data Collector is supported in QuickClick. Merchants using QuickClick can enable Kount and the Data Collector will start functioning in QuickClick with no additional development or settings. 

Gateway.js - Gateway.js supports Kount and integrators need to send a single command to generate the necessary information required to use Kount properly. Users of this feature will be those wanting to use Kount on a third party website when using the Payment API or Collect.js. Integrators will need to integrate to Gateway.js and pass a new variable for the session ID to the gateway on every transaction they wish Kount to function on.

Payment API with Consumer Facing Payment Pages - the Kount Data Collector is a critical part of the analysis and we've made it simple to implement in your own checkout pages when using our Payment API. You will need to pass a new variable for the session ID to the gateway on every transaction you wish Kount to function on. This session ID should be generated every time a payment form is loaded by the cardholder. For more information, please see Running Kount with Payment API. 

Payment API with Services that are Merchant Initiated - if you are building a back office software that doesn’t have customer facing payment pages using the Payment API, you can still use Kount. This would be a case where the merchant should not use the device Data Collector, as these would be merchant initiated transactions. 

Approval Rate Requirement - when Kount is enabled, the Approval Rate Requirement (ARR) feature will be available in the Merchant Portal under Settings → Security Options → Approval Rate Requirement. Setting an Approval Rate Requirement allows the merchant to set a specific percentage they want to always stay above. 

Virtual Terminal - Kount works with Virtual Terminal transactions. This would be a case where the merchant should not use the device Data Collector, as these would be merchant initiated transactions. 

Batch Upload - Kount works with Batch Upload transactions. This would be a case where the merchant should not use the device Data Collector, as these would be merchant initiated transactions. 

Enabling the Service

There is no special signup procedure or third-party system to log into – merchants can sign up for it through the Marketplace UI or Partners can offer it / enable it like most other services on the platform. Just enable Kount in the merchant portal and that’s it!

Log in to your Partner Portal and head over to List Accounts → scroll to the merchants name from the list or search their name in the search box → click on their name → scroll down to the Value-added Services section → click on Add/Edit button on the right side → select the Status to Active or Offered → click on Submit. Please see Value-added Services for more information on what each action (active, offered, not offered) does. 

If you do not have Kount added as a Value-added Services and you would like to have it added to be able to resell it to your merchants, please email support@nmi.com and request Kount to be added to your account. Please provide your Account ID, which is located on the top right corner when you log in, with your request.

Kount Score

The Kount Score (far right column) is risk simplified; Green is good, Yellow suggests challenge, Red means don’t ship the goods!