Before You Walk into that Meeting, Check Ferret First

We may not actually kick the tires before buying a new car these days, but smart people don’t make big purchases without Googling their options or make reservations at pricey restaurants without checking out the reviews beforehand. 

Now, in addition to these common safeguards, check Ferret first. Ferret is a new smartphone app that can spot red flags and danger signs linked to any potential business associate, partner, supplier or employee.

Ferret combines artificial intelligence systems with extensive proprietary databases to find warning signs that other systems can miss, providing a critical competitive edge over search engines like Google, where people can pay to have their profiles scrubbed clean, or user generated content like LinkedIn, where users write their own, unverifiable, profiles. It’s far more useful than pay-as-you-go searches that only scratch the surface or are more concerned with grabbing the user’s credit card number, and so-called people finders online are notoriously out of date.

Let’s say you’re starting your own small business, and you search Google for a website designer to help market and advertise your product or services. You find one that offers high-quality examples, solid testimonials and a reasonable price. You even talk by phone to the designer, who is friendly and helpful, and send in your down payment.

Maybe you want to hire a building contractor to help create office space for your new business, and as requested, he sends you a copy of his most recent professional license. Or maybe you want to hire a general manager to help you find, train and build a team of employees.

Now suppose the website designer takes your payment and then seems to disappear into thin air, not responding to emails or calls, and you learn he’s been sued by several past clients. Suppose the contractor does a shoddy job, and you learn the license you saw has since been suspended. Suppose the general manager you hired had a history of making off-color, racist tweets that had since been deleted.

These unhappy situations could have been avoided with Ferret, which helps people make the right decisions about people they allow into their homes, workplaces and business networks.

Just enter a person’s name and take a look. Ferret will show if someone has been involved in criminal proceedings, had a license revoked or suspended, been the subject of an investigation or worse. In short, Ferret shows whether a person is trustworthy and reliable.

Fraud is on the rise. Online consumer, investment and employment scams have multiplied in the last year, preying on people who are distracted by COVID, busy and rushed, hoping to make extra money or simply vulnerable, according to the Securities and Exchange Commission and the Federal Trade Commission.

Ferret utilizes information that was previously available only to more than  8,000 financial institutions in know-your-customer services and anti-money laundering initiatives. These formerly exclusive global databases cover historical and real time negative news, aliases, illegal activity, corporate ownership history, social media sentiment analysis and much more. And they won’t show up in an Internet search.

Far more informative than a background check, Ferret employs sophisticated artificial intelligence and machine learning to uncover and sift through information that otherwise is buried deep and not easily accessible. The findings are thoroughly real-time and current, providing users with crucial relationship intelligence. Ferret monitors its sources constantly and spots any changes instantly.

Ferret’s far-reaching machine-generated content is continuously validated by users, giving feedback to the AI system to make ongoing updates and improvements.

Using exclusive data and artificial intelligence, Ferret gives companies, employees, managers, vendors, contractors and partnerships the tools they need to identify and protect against risky and possibly costly decisions. We’re putting the power of information back in your hands, where it belongs.

Make sure you really know your contacts. Check Ferret first.