notarizationthe world’s largest online notarization network, is going live prove, a new digital identity verification company and platform. Starting in August, Notarize’s business tools will be rebranded to Proof and the company name will be changed to Proof. Founder Patrick Kinsel said Notarize will continue to serve its online notarization network, which is already used by the likes of Adobe and FedEx, and that the two brands and platforms will co-exist.
In response to the rise of online transactions, Proof is an enterprise-grade platform designed to serve large banks and real estate companies. It will continue to have all the major components of Notarize’s online notarization service, which has been used by millions of users to process transactions for documents such as electronic real estate transactions, vehicle sales bills and identity affidavits and powers of attorney. Proof’s new feature is an identity-assured transaction management platform designed to address the online identity verification gap.
Some examples of services it offers include using biometrics to verify identities (e.g. scanning selfies to make sure they match ID photos), 24/7 human identity verification and signature verification to make sure the signer is who they actually say they are . Proof also looks at the risk of fraud in every transaction, the same way it monitors credit cards. For example, if a signature looks fake, Proof will flag it for review.
Proof’s authentication function
Proof monitors for signs of fraud with a risk score based on data such as location, device fingerprint, carrier network, and previous denials. All of its transactions are encrypted and are NIST IAL-2 compliant and will be AATL compliant later this year. NIST is the National Institute of Science and Technology of the United States that publishes standards used by government agencies and industry. For example, the National Highway Traffic Administration requires e-car sales to be IAL2 compliant, meaning consumers must provide a combination of identification.
Meanwhile, AATL is an Adobe-approved trust list that specifies how to cryptographically sign PDF documents. By satisfying this, Kinsel said, Proof will be the first platform to implement document verification of valid legal identities according to Adobe standards. “Our vision is that everything should be cryptographically signed with an identity, and Acrobat is the trusted reader that instantly confirms the authenticity of every online action,” he added.
If a signer fails Proof’s automatically verified digital assurance, they will be matched with one of Notarize’s 4,000+ notaries to finalize the document and transaction.
Kinsel told TechCrunch that Proof’s ability to confirm identity and flag risks leverages Notarize’s innovations in identity verification, including the ability to verify photo IDs such as driver’s licenses and passports, ask identity challenge questions, perform biometric selfie verification, and confirm consumer addresses, among others. Data attributes of information and phone numbers. “When we swipe our credit card, we know it’s protected by active fraud monitoring, and Proof will provide the same protection for the agreements we enter into,” he said.
Some examples of how Proof could be used include protecting sellers in real estate transactions, where they don’t need notarization but are still at risk, just basic electronic signatures, Kinsel said. Certificates are also used by the retirement industry to protect large withdrawals from fraud, and the automotive industry notarizes forms in some states and meets IAL2 standards elsewhere.
Since its launch in 2015, Notarize has been adopted by 2,200 companies, including First American, iPostal, Guaranteed Rate, Salesforce, SimpleNexus, SnapDocs, USAA, and Zillow. Nearly 80 percent of these transactions are identity confirmations, Notarize said, as electronic signatures are increasingly targeted for fraud as online agreements become more common. Proof was created to extend Notarize’s services beyond notarization and create consumer authentication for every transaction it says is impossible to forge.
Notarize raised a $130 million Series D round in 2021 at a valuation of over $760 million to build Proof. Its investors include Camber Creek, Polaris Ventures and Realogy.
