CEO Statement 2026: Defining the Next Chapter of Identity, Risk, and Trust in Communications

As we broaden our suite of services, we are becoming a true one-stop shop for numbering intelligence and fraud solutions. Our unwavering focus has been on scaling trust across global communications and building on the foundations for a more secure and resilient future for the entire ecosystem.  

Scaling to Serve Global Brands  

2025 marked a strategic shift as we scaled our capacity to serve the world’s largest providers and users of number intelligence data.  

We’re proud to now be working with three out of five of the top global brands as well as major National Brands. These organisations have expectations for integration, support and real-time data that far exceed traditional telecoms requirements. It is a true testament to the team that we’ve successfully scaled to meet these demands and are now partnering at a level that spans the full width of our capabilities, from number intelligence services (NIS) to advanced Mobile Identity services. 

Another major milestone for XConnect this year was the launch of our RiskALERT ™ product suite. 

As a result, we now complement our authoritative datasets, such as number portability, numbering plans and live number status with a new layer of risk information. By integrating GSMA's IRSF Prevention in our IRSFCheck and AITCheck solutions, we were the first partner working with the GSMA to bring risk fraud data into the telecom and CPaaS space, enabling real-time access to third-party fraud-related intelligence. 

Expanding Our Role in Trust and Authentication 

Until now, we’ve been perfecting and delivering our carrier-grade services across the NIS and Mobile Identity space. Driven by global brands and hyperscalers, we have recently expanded into analytics projects, leveraging the vast global datasets we access. 

With over 4 billion queries processed each month, we handle an enormous scale of data which is always fully GDPR compliant. By performing analytics on the trends we’re seeing, we can bring enormous value to the industry in its fight against fraud, spanning critical sectors including identity validation to communications and CPaaS. 

In addition, 2025 saw us move into new areas such as call signing for the first time. This work, largely driven by U.S. regulatory frameworks like STIR/SHAKEN, enabled us to support a major global MNO with their compliance requirements in the US. It also reflects our expanding role in the broader trust ecosystem, where authentication, verification and integrity of communications are becoming core expectations. 

2026 in Focus: Powering Growth & Outpacing Fraud 

Fraud has become a $1 trillion global economy. This is reshaping the communications landscape as fraudsters evolve their techniques at speed and governments introduce new requirements for security, transparency, and consumer protection. 

In 2025, our focus was driving deeper collaboration and delivering richer, more unified solution sets that work seamlessly together. Now fully integrated into our portfolio, Mobile Identity allows us to offer a broader, more powerful suite of capabilities across our entire customer base. 

With 2026 set to bring even greater regulatory momentum and digital transformation, the industry will need to be more adaptive, collaborative, and forward-thinking than ever to overcome fraud. 

Here’s what XConnect will be paying attention to in the year ahead:  

As we move into 2026, one of our top priorities will be continuing to deliver our existing services at scale to the world’s largest operators and brands. We are transitioning from being seen purely as a supplier to becoming a trusted partner.   

This means embedding deeper into customer ecosystems, collaborating on specialised capabilities, and jointly identifying opportunities that help address regulatory requirements across telecoms, banking, fintech, ecommerce and broader digital sectors.  

Ultimately, our focus remains on helping protect enterprises and operators against the trillion-dollar global fraud threat and reinforcing trust across the communications industry.

In 2026, we will continue building on our fully integrated NIS and Mobile Identity capabilities. Historically, these have been delivered by separate providers and often managed in silos. The next stage of evolution is bringing these components together, combining the raw inputs into high-value industry solutions. 

This convergence enables powerful new use cases through richer, more accurate verification services that support operational efficiency, compliance and fraud prevention. This integrated approach will continue to shape the future of identity, risk and trust services by layering capabilities to create better outcomes. 

In 2026, we will advance our solutions by expanding our risk data sources and enhancing how we analyse them. Building on our RiskALERT product portfolio, we’ll continue to work with operators, industry groups and identity specialists to aggregate high-quality third-party datasets into a stronger, more unified risk intelligence layer. 

We’ll also apply deeper analytics by working with third parties to analyse the tens of billions of data points we manage to uncover patterns, correlations, and identities. Moving to AI-enabled analytics will help us move from raw data provision to high-value intelligence that strengthens fraud prevention across the ecosystem. 

Looking ahead, increasing regulatory pressure in the communications and digital identity space will be a major challenge. This is something the industry is starting to recognise.  

With new regulations emerging on a country-by-country scale, operators and enterprises will need to move beyond simply reacting to these regulations. XConnect is committed to helping the industry proactively prepare for the evolving regulatory landscape by developing more advanced solutions such as SAFr Auth. This is driven by regulators around the world starting to mandate a move away from SMS 2FA. This provides a unique, simple-to-deploy network API which provides a far more secure, reliable, and user-friendly authentication experience without 2FA. 

Our shift toward national-level infrastructure aligns with the combined strengths of Somos and XConnect. With Somos’ experience managing the Toll-Free Number Registry, the Reassigned Numbers Database and the North American Number Plan and delivering regulator-led services such as the U.S. Do Not Originate registry and XConnect’s expertise in global number intelligence, we are well positioned to support governments and industries as they adopt similar models worldwide. 

Taking Control in 2026 

As we move into 2026, fraud will not be slowing down. Organisations that fail to take a proactive approach risk falling behind. Access to trusted numbering and identity datais core to reducing fraud, increasing efficiency and service delivery. 

The good news is that the tools to outpace these threats already exist. As an industry leader in NIS and Mobile Identity, XConnect is uniquely positioned to strengthen your defences, reduce fraud, and enable secure, seamless customer experiences in the year ahead. 

A huge thank you to the amazing XConnect team that has worked tirelessly to innovate, collaborate, and deliver solutions that empower our customers. Together, we enter 2026 stronger, more prepared, and ready to tackle the challenges ahead. 

Eli Katz, Founder and CEO 
XConnect, a Somos Company