Ondato: Safe to Use?

Here’s everything about Ondato being trustworthy and safe to use:

In general, Ondato is reasonably safe to use.

It is not a malicious company, and as a legitimate service provider, the company takes many steps to provide robust user and data security across the board.

Whether you are considering outsourcing work to Ondato or a site you use pulled it up, you are in safe hands.

So if you want to learn all about Ondato’s safety, then this article is for you.

Let’s get started!

Ondato: Safe to Use? (Everything to Know)

How Does Ondato Work? (3 Points)

Ondato is a third-party verification platform.

The primary purpose is to match documents or other information to certify that they hold the information that they claim to hold.

Additionally, Odanto offers data management and other services.

On the website, Ondato bills itself as an end-to-end management system, meaning that multiple services work together.

Primarily, Ondato is used by web services to verify that users really do meet requirements that might be in place.

For instance, if something is only accessible to residents of a specific country, Ondato could be used to verify that users are in fact, current residents.

The full range of applications is pretty wide, but this is the basic premise.

As we walk through the mechanisms of how Ondato provides these services, the potential security issues and how those are addressed will become clear.

#1 Basic Processes

The primary verification method used by Ondato is based on facial recognition.

Essentially, a user can take a selfie. They upload that picture along with a picture of a verified photo ID card.

The two pictures are added to the Ondato database, and the system uses AI to confirm that the picture in each image is a match.

In this way, Ondato verifies that the user in question is who they claim to be.

This can be used to confirm any information on the ID card that might include address, country of residency, eligibility for certain qualifications, and more.

Ondato does keep the images on file, so users should not have to repeatedly verify for the same service or system.

#2 Data Management

Artificial intelligence requires huge amounts of data in order to function reliably.

While Ondato has not made their facial recognition algorithm public, it’s safe to assume that it uses neural networks and machine learning.

In the interest of skipping very long explanations of how all of that works, let’s summarize one key idea.

Neural networks become more accurate when they have more data to work with.

Ondato databases the uploads that it receives in order to better train the AI.

So, as the user base for Ondato grows, the software becomes more accurate and more reliable. In this way, it is a safe system that only grows safe over time.

At least, that’s true from the perspective of a company that wants to use Ondato services.

From the end-user perspective, your identity is stored on a third-party server.

We’ll cover how Ondato takes measures to protect this information, but this is a reasonable and significant point of concern.

#3 Compliance Management

Since Ondato can verify a person’s identity, it can also help with compliance management.

One of the best-known uses of Ondato is with OnlyFans.

Because of the site’s business nature, content creators have to meet a minimum age requirement before they are allowed to post.

OnlyFans has outsourced verification to Ondato.

Ondato compares the uploaded selfie to the included ID card.

The ID card is checked to verify that the user’s age is sufficient to allow posting. Additionally, the AI confirms that the selfie matches the ID card.

In this way, Ondato is guaranteeing compliance management on behalf of OnlyFans.

Once again, this demonstrates safety from the perspective of a business that chooses to leverage the services provided by Ondato.

We’ll get into end-user security a little later.

How Does Ondato Provide Security? (3 Facts)

Now you know what Ondato does and how the software goes about providing those services.

Ultimately, Ondato has to log a lot of personal information in order to function.

What does the company do in order to protect users and the information stored on its servers?

There are a lot of actions that Ondato takes on this front.

Rather than list every single one of them, it’s easier to summarize the ideas.

In general, Ondato uses a combination of tech industry standards in order to provide great security.

Additionally, the company combines regulatory oversight requirements to hold itself to a higher level of security.

Lastly, Ondato invests heavily in software and hardware that improves the company’s ability to render high-level security.

Let’s go over each of these ideas in more detail to justify the idea of calling this service “safe.”

#1 Industry Standards

Ondato is making big promises and handling sensitive data.

How do they ensure that everything is above board? It starts by meeting industry standards.

In the tech space, there are standard protocols and systems that guarantee that a service is living up to set expectations.

More specifically, Ondato works with ISO/IEC 27001 : 3013 standards.

These standards were built to create a set of rules and best practices that improve information security.

The entire list of standards is rather long.

The short version is that international tech communities have worked hard to build the standards, and they are internationally recognized.

Any tech service or business that adheres to these standards is extending significant effort to protect data and secure information.

At the very least, data in the hands of Ondato is safer than average because of these standards.

#2 Regulatory Oversight

The efforts and protections don’t start there. Ondato provides services to international users.

Because of that, the company is held to multiple different regulation sets all at the same time. Rather than set different rules depending on the location of the user, Ondato has simplified its process.

All Ondato services and practices live up to all of the regulations necessary.

As an example, the United States and European Union have noticeably different sets of rules when it comes to user privacy and protection.

All Ondato users are protected according to both the US and EU rules.

The same can be said for any other regulation governing Ondato’s business practices.

Ultimately, this approach forces Ondato to provide more robust user and data security than its competitors might. This alone doesn’t guarantee safety, but it’s a big step that many other companies don’t take.

#3 Heavy Investment

Another part of Ondato’s systematic approach to safety is apparent in their security investments.

Ondato is essentially a verification service.

Security is everything to the company, so it invests heavily in security software and hardware.

High-level purchases on both fronts ensure that Ondato lives up to the expectations of its users.

They’ve made a number of these investments public on their website.

You can go there and see how they leverage these purchases and implementations to maximize user security.

Once again, this alone might not be a strong guarantee, but when you combine all of the efforts made by Ondato, you can see why tech experts are ready to call it a relatively safe online service.

If high levels of user authentication are necessary, Ondato’s security implementations make it quite competitive in this niche.

What About Your Security As a User?

So far, most of this discussion has looked at Ondanto from the perspective of a peer business.

OnlyFans considers Ondato to be safe because of everything listed above.

The services are reliable, and the company lives up to the standards and rules that a company like OnlyFans can and should expect.

But, what about the individual users who are caught up in this?

Many of the security measures listed above provide considerable protection to individual users.

Industry standards, regulatory oversight, and security investments are all ultimately intended to protect the information that you might upload.

That said, Ondato cannot fully anonymize data. This separates it from a lot of other tech companies that add that last layer.

With those companies, if their servers were compromised, malicious actors would have a hard time pairing your information to you. This is not the case with Ondato.

Ultimately, there’s one final concern that needs to be addressed.

Putting Your Image and Data on File

While Ondato does put a lot of time, energy, and effort into data security, there’s still an elephant in the room.

Users who didn’t ask to be involved with Ondato are directed to give the company their face and a picture of an ID card.

That ID card includes their name, date of birth, and potential information like where they live.

Simply put, someone can steal your identity with the information on a driver’s license, and Ondato is pairing that with powerful software that can prove you are in fact the person on the license.

For all of the security measures in place, Ondato is essentially making itself a repository of valuable information.

If Ondato servers are ever breached, it could prove catastrophic, and many users with files on the servers will have their identities and financial security compromised.

Arguably, Ondato is as trustworthy as any tech giant. They absolutely try to protect your information, but nothing is completely without risk.

Even though Ondato is safe, if you’re not comfortable providing your picture and ID to the company, then you might be better off avoiding the service altogether.

Author

Theresa McDonough

Tech entrepreneur and founder of Tech Medic, who has become a prominent advocate for the Right to Repair movement. She has testified before the US Federal Trade Commission and been featured on CBS Sunday Morning, helping influence change within the tech industry.

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