The digital landscape is currently witnessing an industrialization of fraud. Legacy defenses, once considered standard, are now struggling to keep pace with sophisticated attackers who operate with the speed of AI. For enterprises, the Request for Proposal (RFP) process is no longer just a bureaucratic hurdle. It is a critical opportunity to filter out reactive “band-aid” fixes and identify account takeover (ATO) fraud solutions that provide preemptive protection.

Most traditional approaches act late in the attack lifecycle, leaving a prolonged window of exposure that attackers exploit with ease. As a result, many organizations are forced into a cycle of investigation, reimbursement, and remediation after fraud has already occurred. This guide outlines the essential questions and criteria your RFP must include to ensure your next partner can stop attacks early and avoid the costs of these efforts altogether.

What should enterprises ask vendors when evaluating account takeover fraud solutions?

When evaluating account takeover fraud solutions, enterprises must move beyond checking boxes for basic compliance. The modern threat landscape demands tools that provide real-time, browser-level visibility and active disruption. A successful RFP will challenge vendors to prove their efficacy at every stage of the attack timeline.

1. Evaluate real-time, browser-level detection for ATO protection

Standard account takeover protection often relies on post-login signals. However, by the time an attacker attempts a login, the credentials have already been stolen. Your RFP should shift the focus to what happens before the login attempt.

  • RFP Question: How should enterprises evaluate real-time, browser-level detection when it comes to ATO?
  • Follow-up: What signals or benchmarks prove that a vendor can detect impersonation threats before credentials are stolen?

Effective detection must happen more proactively upfront. You need to detect the phishing pages in real time or near real time, not days or hours later. Memcyco’s PoSA (Proof of Source Authenticity) technology uses proprietary Nano Defenders added to digital assets combined with persistent device DNA. These defenders detect scam activity while it is unfolding, providing visibility into signals from specific users who visited these pages ahead of time.

2. Neutralize stolen credentials with decoy data

Detection is only half the battle. If a user falls into a trap, the solution must actively disrupt the attacker’s workflow. Many vendors claim to mitigate risk, but few can neutralize the data itself.

  • RFP Question: What RFP language should buyers use to assess whether a vendor neutralizes stolen credentials with decoy data?
  • Follow-up: Can vendors prove that stolen logins become immediately useless and traceable?

Memcyco disrupts the harvesting process by replacing credentials on the fly. When a victim enters their details into a phishing site, Memcyco swaps real data with decoy data. This not only protects the customer but allows security teams to trace the intelligence of when those decoy credentials are utilized on the official site later.

3. Require granular visibility into targeted users and sessions

Visibility should not be limited to a general alert that a spoofed domain exists. To protect customers effectively, fraud teams need to know exactly who is at risk.

  • RFP Question: What should an RFP require in terms of visibility into targeted users, spoofed domains, or compromised sessions?
  • Follow-up: How granular should this telemetry be per user, per device, or per portal?

Enterprises need telemetry that highlights which specific users fell into spoofed domains. Telemetry should be granular enough to identify the specific device and location used during the scam. Memcyco provides highly granular insight into impersonating assets, compromised sessions, and individual victims. This includes understanding which application was being impersonated and the exact timestamp of the visit.

4. Prioritize frictionless authenticity indicators

Security should never come at the cost of the user experience. If a solution requires the user to perform extra steps, adoption will plummet and friction will rise.

  • RFP Question: How should companies ask about customer-facing authenticity indicators?
  • Follow-up: Can vendors guarantee a frictionless experience that boosts user trust without extra steps?

The vendor should design a solution that protects customers without requiring an agent or extra mobile app. Memcyco’s PoSA provides a visible “seal of authenticity” that assures users they are on a genuine site. Because the deployment is agentless, there is no customer friction or behavior change required. This boosts user trust while maintaining a seamless digital experience.

5. Address modern attack vectors beyond email

Phishing has evolved far beyond simple targeted emails. Attackers now use sophisticated techniques to bypass security controls and manipulate search results.

  • RFP Question: What questions should an RFP include to ensure the solution covers modern ATO attack vectors, not just phishing emails?
  • Follow-up: Does the vendor address SEO poisoning, evil twin Wi-Fi, or reverse proxy phishing?

A forward-looking RFP must account for SEO poisoning, where bad actors boost the rankings of fake sites to lure searchers. The solution must also mitigate Man-in-the-Middle (MitM) attacks and reverse proxies. Memcyco is designed to detect and disrupt these sophisticated vectors that legacy brand protection tools often miss.

6. Evaluate deployment and scalability

Long integration cycles are the enemy of security. An ATO solution that takes months to deploy leaves the enterprise vulnerable during that entire window.

  • RFP Question: How should an RFP frame deployment requirements – and what makes agentless options more scalable?
  • Follow-up: Can the vendor demonstrate installation speed and low integration overhead?

The easier the deployment model, the higher the adoption and quicker the time to value. Memcyco operates in an agentless model with no end-user installation. Deployment should ideally take one or two people within a 30-minute session rather than requiring complex SDKs or app changes. This allows the organization to scale up faster and ramp up protection much sooner.

7. Assess integration with SIEM and SOAR tools

An ATO solution should not operate in a vacuum. It must enrich your existing security stack with data that was previously unobtainable.

  • RFP Question: What RFP criteria should be used to assess integration with SIEM, SOAR, or fraud detection tools?
  • Follow-up: Can the solution deliver role-based visibility for security and fraud teams?

Memcyco provides APIs for anti-fraud tools and SIEM systems. Telemetry should be split to provide infrastructure data to security teams and per-user data to fraud risk teams. This allows each department to prioritize actionable data without being inundated by irrelevant signals.

8. Request measurable business outcomes

At the end of the day, an ATO solution must prove its worth. Avoid vendors who only provide vanity metrics like the number of sites flagged.

  • RFP Question: What measurable outcomes should an RFP request to verify the solution’s impact on ATO prevention?
  • Follow-up: Can the vendor share pre and post metrics from enterprise environments?

Your RFP should request data on the reduction of ATO incidents and the shortening of investigation times. Memcyco delivers a 10× ROI within the first year and up to a 90% reduction in investigation time. Proactive measures move the needle from reactive research to immediate mitigation the minute an attack is spun up.

9. Ensure non-disruptive login flows

Many security tools claim to stop fraud but end up locking out legitimate customers. This false positive problem can be as damaging to a brand as the fraud itself.

  • RFP Question: How should an RFP assess user experience protections and make sure security doesn’t disrupt login flows?
  • Follow-up: Can the solution protect customers without requiring downloads or behavior changes?

Protections should ideally only trigger on malicious sites and phishing sites. This ensures that normal login flows for legitimate customers remain undisturbed. Memcyco’s agentless approach protects users automatically without disrupting their experience or requiring software downloads.

10. Ask about roadmap and threat adaptability

The threat landscape is constantly changing. Your vendor must be a partner in innovation, not just a service provider.

  • RFP Question: What should a forward-looking RFP ask about a vendor’s roadmap or threat adaptability?
  • Follow-up: Is the platform designed to counter AI-generated phishing and future impersonation trends?

An RFP should ask how a vendor takes input from customers to develop their roadmap. Vendors must address emerging threats like AI-generated attacks, mobile app fraud, and social engineering. Memcyco views security as a community effort, evolving its platform based on the real-world challenges its customers face.

 

Secure Your Future Against ATO Fraud

Legacy security tools leave you one step behind the attacker. Every minute you wait for a takedown is a minute an attacker spends harvesting your customers’ data. Memcyco offers the only solution that infiltrates active attacks to neutralize stolen data in real time.

Contact Memcyco today to see how we can reduce your ATO incidents by 50% while providing a 10x ROI.

 

FAQ: Evaluating Account Takeover Fraud Solutions

Why are domain takedown services no longer sufficient for ATO protection? Takedown services are reactive and slow, often taking days to remove a site. By then, bad actors have already harvested credentials, and they can easily set up new sites to replace taken-down ones.

How does agentless deployment differ from traditional security agents? Traditional agents require customers to download software, which has a low adoption rate and creates friction. Agentless deployment adds a single line of code to digital assets, protecting all users without any extra steps.

What is the “window of exposure” in an ATO attack? The window of exposure is the time between a fake site going live and it being taken down. During this time, attackers harvest data. Real-time protection closes this window by disrupting the attack while it is unfolding.

Can decoy data be used to track attackers? Yes. When Memcyco replaces real credentials with decoy data, it allows security teams to trace when and where those fake credentials are utilized on the official site, providing real-time intelligence on attacker activity.

Does real-time protection replace MFA? No. Real-time protection complements MFA. MFA can be bypassed by reverse proxy phishing and MitM techniques; Memcyco identifies these bypass attempts before credentials are stolen.

How do AI-generated phishing attacks impact ATO defense? AI allows attackers to create more convincing and frequent attacks. Modern solutions must be able to detect these machine-generated threats in near real time at the browser level to be effective.

Digital Impersonation Fraud Specialist