Scaling Identity Verification: How Growth Raises Fraud and Friction Risks

As companies grow, identity risk compounds across verification systems. PYMNTS Intelligence’s “Scale Amplification: How Revenue Scale Amplifies Agent-Driven Identity Risk,” a collaboration with Trulioo, finds that larger firms face greater identity risk, more agent-driven threats, more actual losses and more customer friction. The data shows that scale doesn’t just create a bigger target. It changes the kind of identity attacks companies face and raises the cost of getting verification wrong.

Agent-Driven Identity Risk

Agent-Driven Identity Risk Grows With Scale

Know Your Agent (KYA) threat prevalence rises from 46% among firms with $50 million to $250 million in annual revenue to 71% among firms with $1 billion or more in annual revenue. No other threat category scales as sharply with revenue.

Sharper Attacks

Larger firms are more likely to face sophisticated attacks tied to identity risk. Among $1 billion-plus firms, 58% report AI-generated identity documents or deepfakes, compared with 47% of the smallest firms.

Losses Rise at Larger Firms

Agent threats are more likely to become financial losses at larger firms. Among $1 billion-plus companies that identify KYA as a threat, 80% report actual losses tied to those threats.

Internal Exposure Expands

As firms scale, they tend to bring more identity risk and verification systems in-house. Among $1 billion-plus firms, 74% manage KYC/KYB internally. Yet internal-only firms that don’t also work with a third-party provider report higher KYA incident rates than those with hybrid models.

Identity Risk Raises Customer Friction

The largest firms are most likely to face rising friction. One-third of $1 billion-plus companies say digital transaction decline rates increased in the past year, while 22% report rising false positives.

Methodology

This data book is based on the April 2026 report, “Scale Amplification: How Revenue Scale Amplifies Agent-Driven Identity Risk,” a PYMNTS Intelligence collaboration with Trulioo. Data in the report comes from a survey of 350 companies conducted from Aug. 1–Sept. 10, 2025, and respondents represented companies in North America, Europe, Asia-Pacific, the Middle East, Africa and Latin America. The report examines how digital identity verification systems prevent fraud and support growth across industries, including financial services, gig platforms, online marketplaces, retail, software, travel and hospitality.