Fighting Digital Identity Theft in Banking: Lessons from Emirates NBD

Introduction

Every day, customers trust banks with their most valuable asset: their digital identity. But what happens when that trust is targeted by fraudsters? In the MENA region, where the banking sector is booming at a 9.8% CAGR, digital impersonation and brand infringement are no longer rare—they’re a growing threat that can erode customer confidence and damage reputations overnight. 

Fraudsters create fake accounts, clone websites, and impersonate financial institutions, triggering compliance risks, financial losses, and long-term trust deficits that are far costlier to repair than to prevent. 

In this blog, you’ll discover: 

• The rising threat of brand impersonation in the MENA banking sector 

• Why traditional monitoring often fails against evolving infringement tactics 

• A step-by-step overview of mFilterIt’s OSINT-powered brand protection 

• Case Study: How Emirates NBD safeguarded their digital integrity 

• Why OSINT-driven brand protection is essential for banks to protect customers and reputation 

Understanding the Rising Threat of Brand Infringement in the MENA Banking Industry

Brand infringement in banking has seen a contagious evolution with sophisticated, omni-channel impersonation campaigns deceiving customers and damaging a bank’s credibility. 

These digital threats take many forms: 

• Fake banking apps and websites that mimic legitimate platforms to harvest user credentials and financial data. 

• Impersonated social media accounts posing as customer service channels to extract personal information or redirect users to malicious sites. 

• Fraudulent job or loan offers leveraging a bank’s name and logo to collect sensitive documents and scam applicants. 

• Deceptive investment or reward campaigns that promise high returns or bonuses while diverting funds to fraudulent accounts. 

• Unauthorized use of brand visuals in phishing emails or SMS campaigns, misleading customers into sharing confidential details and using them further, breaching the right to privacy. 

Why Traditional Monitoring Alone Isn’t Enough to Safeguard Banks?

Traditional monitoring can track and identify only surface level scams however, as fraudsters, with their tactics, present more severe methods, it becomes important for banks to upscale their defences. Here’s why traditional systems fall short:   

• Limited visibility across dark web, social, and app ecosystems: Traditional monitoring practices are limited to only surface level identification whereas the fraudster tactics are going deeper into underground forums, dark web marketplaces, and cloned mobile apps where scams are arranged. The inability of banks to have an omni-channel visibility makes them more prone to sophisticated crimes. 

• Manual validation that delays response to fast-moving scams: Manual intervention once played a crucial role in handling the infringement cases. However, with scams now evolving and spreading at an unprecedented speed, it can no longer be the primary line of defence. By the time the manual validation arrives, scams have spread across multiple platforms, creating non-compliance problems in a highly sensitive banking industry. 

• Lack of AI-driven threat correlation across different channels: Fraudsters do not aim at targeting single channel at a point of time, they target multiple channels simultaneously including websites, social media platforms, mobile apps, and messaging services. Without AI-driven correlation, it is nearly impossible to detect attack at the initial stage, making it difficult to respond effectively or prevent further spread. 

• Traditional systems often miss subtle threats: Fraudsters exploit language variations, misspellings, or regional slang, and use slight changes in logos, fonts, or layouts to mimic brands. These nuances can deceive customers and bypass manual or rule-based detection, causing reputational and financial harm. 

• No real-time intelligence for proactive action: Still waiting for the reports? They will be drafted once the damage is done and this drawback of manual validation can cost you millions. Hence real-time intelligence is critical than ever, enabling brands to act proactively. Without it, businesses face delayed mitigation, leading to increased customer exposure and major financial losses. 

How mFilterit’s OSINT-Powered Protection Guards the Digital Banking Ecosystem?

Overcoming the limitations of traditional monitoring, at mFilterIt, our brand protection solution, Sentinel+, ensures your intellectual property remains fully under your control, keeping fraudsters at bay. Powered by Open-Source Intelligence (OSINT), Sentinel+ delivers proactive protection built on three core pillars.  

Process to Identify Infringed Brand Assets: A Step-by-Step Overview

• Identification – Clients provide Sentinel+ with their official assets like logos, URLs, social media handles, YouTube channels, and instant messaging handles. Sentinel+ continuously scans these platforms to detect potential misuse or impersonation. 

• Classification – Once potential infringements are detected, Sentinel+ categorizes and shares them with the client for review. The client then determines the status of each case, updating the system with entries for either the whitelist (safe) or blacklist (malicious). 

• Action – URLs identified on social media, YouTube, or IM platforms are flagged for further action. Malicious or “suspicious” links are submitted for takedown or blacklisting, while legitimate or safe URLs are whitelisted and recorded in Sentinel+ for ongoing monitoring. 

Protecting Customer Trust: How Emirates NBD Leveraged OSINT to Stay Ahead of Brand Threats 

As a data-first, digital-focused bank that proactively works to safeguard customer, Emirates NBD decided to partner with mFilterIt to strengthen its monitoring & protection framework.  

Sentinel+ Intervention

With an advanced OSINT-based brand protection solution, Sentinel+, notable impact was seen, and major misuses detected like – 

• 51.14% of fake offers were detected. 

• 27.16% were fake credit card offers. 

• 18.76% were fake job promotions. 

• 1.24% originated from sponsored ads. 

• 1.23% were linked to fake social media handles. 

• 0.47% were due to other types of misuse. 

What did mFilterIt’s Advanced OSINT–Based Brand Protection Cover?

• Holistic Monitoring

  Continuous, real-time scanning across websites, app stores, social media, messaging platforms, and marketplaces to detect potential threats wherever they emerge. 

• Multilingual Detection

  Advanced coverage in English, Arabic, and regional dialects to identify even the most subtle attempts at brand misuse. 

• Visual Tracking

  AI-driven recognition of unauthorized use of logos, colors, and brand identity to protect brand integrity. 

Why is it Important for Banks to Utilize OSINT and Maximize Customer Trust?

• Prevent Financial Losses – Proactively detecting scams, phishing, and impersonation helps avoid direct monetary damage. 

• Maintain Regulatory Compliance – Continuous monitoring of digital channels reduces the risk of breaches and be compliant with the regulatory guidelines.   

• Gain Proactive Threat Intelligence – Real-time insights enable banks to identify and respond to emerging threats before they affect customers. 

• Safeguard Brand and Competitive Advantage – Robust brand protection preserves reputation, deters fraud, and strengthens market positioning. 

Conclusion 

In a highly sensitive banking industry where digital trust evolves faster, financial institutions cannot afford to face regulatory failures and erode customer trust. Here’s why OSINT-powered brand protection, such as mFilterIt’s Sentinel+, helps to ensure an expansive approach to protect brand integrity.