Appriss Insights President Discusses ‘Knowledge for Good’

SINCE 1994, Appriss, Inc. has been building “Knowledge for Good™.” What started with the flagship VINE® network has grown into a trusted source of criminal justice intelligence and is now part of Appriss Insights. President Brian Matthews sat down to discuss the business and the data that has helped to power the Appriss, Inc. Knowledge for Good mission for nearly three decades.

 

BRIAN, CAN YOU GIVE OUR READERS A LITTLE BACKGROUND ABOUT APPRISS INSIGHTS?

Matthews: Appriss, Inc. was founded in 1994 with the creation of the VINE network, a proprietary victim notification network that empowers individuals with timely and reliable information regarding incarcerated persons. In addition to helping keep crime victims safe, our data assets are used in background checks within the hiring process to help identify and mitigate people-based risk. They can also be used by law enforcement and government agencies to support active investigations and aid in the efficient delivery of government entitlement programs, helping to get much-needed benefits to those who are eligible while mitigating fraud and reducing waste.

Eventually, the technology behind VINE became the foundation of Appriss Insights, the division of Appriss, Inc. that Equifax has agreed to purchase. There are more than 20 federal agencies as well as state agencies in all 50 states that trust Appriss Insights’ cloud-based data services, as do thousands of employers and background screeners. 

THE VINE NETWORK IS APPRISS INSIGHTS’ FLAGSHIP SOLUTION. COULD YOU TELL US MORE ABOUT HOW THIS STARTED AND HOW IT HAS SUPPORTED THE APPRISS MISSION?

Matthews: VINE was created in response to the tragic story of Mary Byron, a young woman who lost her life on her 21st birthday when she was murdered by a violent ex-boyfriend, who had been released from jail without Mary’s knowledge. The question on everyone’s mind after Mary’s untimely death was, “What if we had known that her attacker had been released?”

VINE uses Appriss Insights’ robust incarceration data network to deliver more than 25 million victim notifications every year and is utilized by 47 states and the territory of Guam to help protect crime victims. We  maintain a comprehensive and up-to-date incarceration data network, and manage the largest victim notification platform, which alerts victims when their offender has been released from jail or even moved to another facility. 

Through VINE, victims have access to immediate notifications about their offender’s status and 24-hour support through our call center. This is Knowledge for Good*. 

We also created the Mary Byron Project with a mission to end intimate partner violence.

And, we’ve created a platform of additional unique data solutions including a national criminal justice database, NCIS™, the industry’s most extensive and flexible national criminal file. In addition to helping keep crime victims safe, we have brought other differentiated data assets into our portfolio, as we expanded the idea of Knowledge for Good, under the Appriss banner, that are used by background screeners and employers for background checks within the hiring process to help identify and mitigate people-based risk. 

Our data - gathered from publicly available sources and cross-checked by the Appriss Insights team - helps law enforcement, enterprises, and government agencies to support active investigations and aids in the efficient delivery of government entitlement programs, helping to mitigate fraud and reduce waste. Importantly, this can help government agencies make it easier for people to obtain social service benefit determinations in a timely manner. That same data also is used by those government entitlement programs to proactively support the resumption of social service benefits for individuals post-incarceration. 

Appriss Insights data is made available to employers through CRAs and background screeners with the understanding that arrest data by itself is not actionable in the hiring process. The availability of the Appriss Insights data gives organizations the ability to employ someone who might otherwise have been excluded from employment using solely criminal records data. I shared some additional thoughts on this in our home state of Kentucky a few weeks ago. 

We also created the National Precursor Log Exchange (NPLEx), a logging and compliance system that tracks sales of over-the-counter cold and allergy medications containing pseudoephedrine, precursor to the illegal drug, methamphetamine - helping keep communities healthy and safe. And, our most recent data set that follows the Knowledge for Good mission is ProviderSafe™, our medical credentialing data that has been designed to streamline healthcare credentialing and medical sanctions compliance with faster, more comprehensive screening and verification services for the healthcare industry.

HOW WILL THIS ACQUISITION IMPACT CUSTOMERS?

Matthews: Appriss Insights and Equifax will continue to operate as two independent organizations until the transaction is completed. Following the formal close of this acquisition, we expect that our customers will continue to receive the same great support and service from the same great team. Appriss Insights and Equifax are data companies, committed to delivering insights and supporting good decisions. Both companies focus on how knowledge can move people and communities forward - Equifax with “Powering the World With Knowledge,” and the Appriss, Inc. legacy of “Knowledge for Good.”

I believe that Appriss Insights and the Equifax Workforce Solutions business unit have very complementary expertise in verifications, and this acquisition accelerates the build-out of a strategic data hub for verifications that will carry the mission forward by supporting the increasing demand for real-time data that helps employers, social service agencies, law enforcement and communities be better informed and make better, more accurate and actionable decisions. 

Note: Appriss Health and Appriss Retail will remain part of Appriss Inc. and are not a part of this transaction. The transaction is subject to customary closing conditions and regulatory review and is expected to close in the second half of 2021. To read more about the Equifax agreement to acquire Appriss Insights and how it supports Equifax’s growth strategy, click here. 

* The ‘Knowledge for Good’ tagline is a trademark of Appriss, Inc and is used with permission.