MACH, a provider of cloud-based managed communication services, has announced the launch of its Revenue Protection Solution, which is designed to help M2M service providers reduce losses from fraud and malicious activity on their networks. As part of the company’s broader protection portfolio, the new solution helps protect against SIM cloning, call selling, and denial of service attacks.

As the M2M market grows, so do fraudulent threats. Analysys (News - Alert) Mason has forecast that the total number of M2M connections will grow from 62 million in 2010 to 2.1 billion devices in 2020. Machina Research, meanwhile, has predicted that M2M connections will make up around 19 percent of total mobile connections by 2020, with mobile operators set to take €40 billion of the €714 billion M2M market. With such a large market, the potential of losses to fraud and malicious attacks represents a considerable sum of money.

MACH’s (News - Alert) solution protects service providers by mapping IMSIs to machine ID numbers, providing an alert or SIM block when a mismatch occurs. Geographical and time checks on call patterns, meanwhile, prevent the SIMs from moving beyond preset locations, helping to prevent fraud brought about through SIM theft. The service can also check for password cracking signatures and block SIMs based on the likelihood of a potential hack. Pattern recognition is also applied to alert the service provider if the contracted usage pattern starts to change.

Joseph George, Director Product Management, Fraud & Revenue Assurance, MACH, commented, “As the M2M market matures, the potential impact of fraud is becoming clear. M2M devices are generally located in exposed locations, susceptible to SIM card theft, while host machines can be targeted by hackers going through individual devices. Simple human error is also an issue and can lead to services not being billed properly. Such issues can lead to significant revenue losses for M2M operators.”

MACH’s complete portfolio protects fixed and mobile operators and service providers across both international and domestic environments. It presents an attractive solution to operators because its cloud-based managed model allows it to provide services based entirely on an OPEX model.