# Detect duplicate invoice financing across banks

> Telecommunications group e& enterprise, formerly Etisalat Digital, runs the nationwide UAE Trade Connect platform against invoice fraud together with First Abu Dhabi Bank and Avanza Innovations. Each participating bank submits invoice attributes through its own network node, and an AI-driven engine checks them against all other submissions for duplicates without exposing customer data to competitors. The platform went live in April 2021 with seven commercial banks and screened invoices worth around AED 10 billion in its first year of operation.

**Sector:** Tertiary sector · **Industry:** Banking and financial services · **Organisation:** e& enterprise (vormals Etisalat Digital) · **Maturity level:** Production

Canonical URL: https://www.sapientblock.com/en/use-cases/e-und-enterprise-doppelfinanzierung-rechnungen-bankenuebergreifend-erkennen

## Documentation status

- **Project status:** Production
- **Evidence:** Evidence medium
- **Editorial review:** pending

## Description

The telecommunications group e& enterprise operates a nationwide platform together with First Abu Dhabi Bank and Avanza Innovations, through which banks in the United Arab Emirates detect invoice fraud. In invoice discounting, a company submits the same invoice to several banks, and because banks do not share customer data for competition and data protection reasons, this only becomes apparent after the damage has occurred. Through the shared platform, each bank only submits invoice features and receives a fraud assessment as a result, without seeing the business data of competitors.

The platform was announced in July 2020 and went live nationwide in April 2021 with seven commercial banks: Commercial Bank International, Commercial Bank of Dubai, Emirates NBD, First Abu Dhabi Bank, Mashreq Bank, National Bank of Fujairah and RAKBANK. In addition to these banks, the Central Bank of the United Arab Emirates is represented on the steering committee, giving the platform its nationwide character. Technically, each bank participates via its own node in an access-restricted ledger and submits invoice features there, but not the complete customer data. An AI-supported verification engine compares each submission against all others as well as external sources for duplicates and anomalies, returning only the verification result to the banks. In the first year of operation, invoices worth around ten billion dirhams, approximately 2.7 billion US dollars, were checked for double financing in this way. The case shows that competitors can jointly combat fraud if the architecture is designed to be data-minimising from the outset.

## Benefits

- Reduced losses from invoice fraud in financing business.
- A transferable model for competition-neutral data exchange between competitors.
- Double financing is detected before payment rather than after the damage has occurred.
- Banks retain their customer data because only verification features are submitted.
- In the first year of operation, invoices worth around ten billion dirhams were checked.
- The involvement of the Central Bank on the steering committee gives the platform nationwide binding authority.
- Automated pre-verification instead of manual sampling.
- Clearer basis for decisions in credit assessment.

## Challenges

- Competing institutions must agree on joint governance and data standards.
- The benefit only arises when a relevant portion of the banks in a market participate.
- The balance between meaningful verification features and data minimisation must be continuously maintained.
- AI-supported verification generates false alarms that must be evaluated by analysts.
- Data protection functions must continuously monitor which features are submitted.

## Technology foundation

UAE Trade Connect combines an access-restricted ledger, in which each bank participates via its own node, with an AI-supported verification engine for matching the submitted invoice features. A distributed ledger is key here because competing banks want to jointly detect fraud without giving each other insight into their customer relationships.

## Sources

- [UAE trade finance platform goes live with invoice fraud solution](https://www.gtreview.com/news/fintech/uae-trade-finance-platform-goes-live-with-invoice-fraud-solution/)
- [First Abu Dhabi Bank, Etisalat launch UAE trade finance blockchain](https://www.ledgerinsights.com/first-abu-dhabi-bank-etisalat-launch-uae-trade-finance-blockchain/)
- [Blockchain anti-fraud platform UAE Trade Connect processes $2.7 billion](https://www.ledgerinsights.com/blockchain-anti-fraud-platform-uae-trade-connect-processes-2-7-billion/)
- [UAE Trade Connect blockchain platform to combat financial fraud launched](https://www.telecomreview.com/articles/telecom-operators/4860-uae-trade-connect-blockchain-platform-to-combat-financial-fraud-launched/)