LexisNexis moves into the identity verification market

LexisNexis does not have a complex marketing strategy, and it does not need one. Take its legal search products as an example. By giving Lexis away free to law students, future attorneys are quickly habituated to using it for all of their research needs, and therefore law firms are forced to open large corporate accounts that will last throughout eternity. Journalists are similarly reliant, so much so that older reporters often have to tell the cubs to get off the computer and do some real reporting. LexisNexis simply makes user-friendly search tools that its users cannot live without, and then sits back and watches the money roll in. It is a good business, but the company, with 13,000 employees worldwide, has long wanted to expand beyond the data services industry. After 9/11, it got its chance.

The company is now quickly carving out a place in the homeland security sector, having already developed and deployed the HAZMAT Screening Gateway for the Transportation Security Administration (TSA). The Screening Gateway, used to review and process applications for hazardous materials endorsements on commercial drivers’ licenses, automates the fusion of data from multiple government databases and employs sophisticated scoring technologies against applicant information to assess risk based on government suitability standards. LexisNexis is also a player in the business continuity sector, providing back-up and disaster recovery services. Now we hear the company is making perhaps its biggest move yet — into the identity verification business.

Last week the company announced the Screening and Identity Verification component of its LexisNexis Advanced Government Solutions products, which include Intelligence Analysis Solutions and LexisNexis Investigative. The technology is not new — the company uses it for its InstantID technology for the financial sector — but the application is. Both HSPD-12, which establishes a common standard for government employee identification, and the REAL ID Act, which does the same for driver’s licenses, require identity verification services, and LexisNexis intends to grab market share as both programs ramp up their efforts in the face of looming deadlines. There is also a disaster relief component: screening and identity verification tools are critical to defending against the sort of fraud witnessed during the post-Hurricane Katrina effort, as well as preventing malfeasance in government entitlement programs more generally.

-read more in this company news release