Addressing an industry meeting of property/casualty insurance claims and special investigations executives, Susan Q. Hood, State Farm claims vice president and chairperson of a working group on fraud data, announced a number of enhancements that will help mitigate the impact of fraud on the insurance industry and consumers.

In her speech at the 2007 Insurance Fraud Management Conference in Phoenix, Hood described eight data initiatives designed to improve data collection, data sharing, and data analytics for fighting fraud through the services of the ISO ClaimSearch all-claims database and system. "Fraud is a huge problem, costing the insurance industry more than $30 billion a year, and these initiatives will help the industry to better combat it," says Hood.

The initiatives were developed by a fraud data working group made up of representatives from the insurance industry, the National Insurance Crime Bureau (NICB), and ISO. The initiatives will enable ISO's all-claims database to be leveraged as the principal repository for claims and fraud data. "The specific initiatives will provide more actionable information for special investigations units and NICB investigators to improve their ability to identify fraudulent claims," says Hood.