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Document report

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This is an introductory guide and overview for the Document report.

You'll find API documentation separately.

Introduction

The Document report is composed of data integrity, visual authenticity and police record checks. It checks the internal and external consistency of the identity document provided by the applicant to identify potential discrepancies.

If available, the Document report uses Near Field Communication (NFC) to validate the document's chip in order to verify the document. In this case, the visual authentication, image integrity and data consistency checks will not be performed. Please read our NFC for Document report guide for details on how to integrate and use NFC for Document reports.

In addition, any data extracted from the document is returned in the properties attribute.

The Document report combines software and an expert team to maximise fraud detection. The majority of documents will be processed instantly. However, when document analysis falls back to expert review, the report status will be delivered asynchronously via webhook notifications. You can read about webhooks in our API documentation.

Expert review is required when we encounter images that use sophisticated counterfeiting techniques, or the image is of poor quality (blurred, low resolution, obscured, cropped, or held at an unreadable angle).

The Document report breakdown tree

The Document report uniquely uses the sub_result field in the API response to give a more detailed description than the result:

Sub-result
Clear If all underlying verifications pass.
Rejected If the report has returned information where the check cannot be processed further (for example, poor image quality or unsupported document).
Suspected The analysed document is suspected to be fraudulent.
Caution If any other underlying verifications fail, but they don't necessarily point to a fraudulent document (for example, the name provided by the applicant doesn't match the one on the document).

Breakdowns are made up of sub-breakdowns. A breakdown will have a consider result when at least one of its sub-breakdowns contains a consider or unidentified result.

Breakdowns and sub-breakdowns are mapped to particular sub-results. Certain mappings can be changed, where possible, depending on your configuration.

You can use the Document report breakdown tree diagram to understand the mapping of different sub-breakdowns and breakdowns to a sub-result, and the options for configuration. You can also read how individual breakdowns contribute to the overall sub_result value in the Document report in our API documentation.

Note: The following diagram illustrates the options available in API v2 and v3.

Document report breakdown tree 1

The following diagram shows the reasons which can lead to specific sub-breakdowns and therefore sub-results other than 'Clear' in API v2 and v3:

Document report breakdown tree 2

You may find our guide on "suggested client actions" for the Document report useful.

BETA Document reports

Almost all use cases will require the 'primary' Document report, but yours may require one of the following BETA Document reports:

  • Document with Address Information
  • Document with Driving Licence Information

Contact your account manager for more information about the features in these BETA reports.

Breakdown descriptions

Breakdown Sub-breakdown(s) Description
Age validation Minimum accepted age Asserts whether the age calculated from the document’s date of birth data point is greater than or equal the minimum accepted age set at account level. The default minimum age is 16 years old but you can request to have this changed.
Data comparison Date of birth Indicates whether the information points extracted from the document match the information supplied when creating an applicant through the API.
Last name
First name
Data validation Date of birth Determines whether the data point is the expected length and format for this document type.
Document numbers
Machine Readable Zone (MRZ)
Gender
Expiry date
Document expiration Validates the expiry date extracted from a document, flagging if a document’s expiry date has passed.
Barcode Validates the barcode against the defined standard for this document type. (Only available in v3.2 onwards)
Image integrity Conclusive document quality Measures the ability to make a fraud assessment based on the quality of the applicant's document. Applied by our expert manual review team when documents are unclassifiable as fraudulent or genuine.
Colour picture Flags if the image is black and white. This is because black and white documents prevent a full fraud assessment as the majority of security features are colour.
Image quality Flags if there is a low-resolution image where the document information is not readable, the MRZ (Machine Readable Zone) is obscured or unreadable or vital data points are obscured or unreadable.
Supported document Determines whether Onfido currently supports that type of document.
Data consistency Date of expiry Indicates whether data that appears in multiple places on the document, for example in the MRZ and printed on the front, is consistent in both places.
Document type
Nationality
Issuing country
Document numbers
Gender
First name
Last name
Date of birth
Multiple data sources present Acts as a validation for the `data_consistency` breakdown: if 2 sources are present, then data comparison is possible. (Only available in v3.1 onwards)
Visual authenticity Face detection Indicates whether a face was detected on the document.
Original Document Present (ODP) Indicates whether the provided image is an image of the original document or, for example, a photo of a photo of a document or a photo of a computer screen.
Fonts Indicates whether fonts in the document match the expected ones.
Picture face integrity Flags if the pictures of the person identified on the document show signs of tampering or alteration.
Digital tampering Flags when security features expected on the document are missing or wrong and are suspected to be tampered with digitally.
Security features Flags if security features expected on the document are missing or wrong.
Template Indicates whether the document matched the expected template for the document type and country it is from.
Other Flags when other sub-breakdowns under visual authenticity are flagged. Returned for backwards compatibility.
Compromised document Document Database Indicates whether the document has been recorded as either stolen, lost or the individual has been a victim of identity fraud. Additionally, this breakdown can also indicate that the document was either taken from the internet or has been exposed publicly on the internet
Repeat Attempts Asserts whether the document has been reused in a suspicious way
Police record Indicates whether a document has been lost, stolen or compromised
Issuing Authority NFC Passive Authentication Asserts whether the document's NFC chip data was tampered with. (Only available in v3.2 onwards)
NFC Active Authentication Asserts whether the document's NFC chip is original or cloned. (Only available in v3.2 onwards)
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