Technology

The Justice Department says it foiled a plot by a fired Fannie Mae contract worker to destroy all the data on the GSE's 4,000 computer servers nationwide. The worker, 35-year-old Rajendrasinh Makwana, of Glen Allen, Va., is scheduled for arraignment Friday in U.S. District Court in Baltimore on one count of computer intrusion, according to a report in the Associated Press. U.S. Attorney Rod Rosenstein said Mr. Makwana was fired in late October. The prosecutor said that on that day Mr. Makwana programmed a computer with a malicious code that was set to spread throughout Fannie's network of servers and destroy all the data by the end of January 2009. Mr. Makwana's public defender has yet to comment on the charges.

Global financial services consulting firm Headstrong has acquired business process outsourcing firm Lydian Data Services, Boca Raton, Fla. The sale price was not disclosed, but all LDS staff will be retained as the objective is to grow the LDS business further. However, within the next three to six months the LDS name will be grandfathered and the business unit will be dubbed Headstrong Business Services. With the acquisition of LDS and its platforms, Headstrong will position itself as a consulting firm that can offer a full suite of services from consulting and implementation to mortgage processing to its global clientele. Further, according to Headstrong, the acquisition of LDS will strengthen Headstrong's U.S. operations, through the addition of processing centers in Atlanta and Boca Raton.

Only one-third of financial institutions are using the Internet to send confidential documents to customers, partners and service providers using a secure electronic document delivery solution, according to a recent Wolters Kluwer Financial Services survey. Nearly 62% of the 347 banks, credit unions and mortgage companies responding to the survey said they are using the Internet to transmit confidential documents such as loan disclosures and documents. Of those institutions, however, only one-third say they are using a secure electronic delivery solution. Approximately another third are using traditional e-mail, which does not encrypt customer data. The remainder use less secure document delivery methods such as password protected e-mail and websites, regular or overnight mail, or are not sure of the method they use. According to Jason Marx, vice president and general manager, Mortgage, Wolters Kluwer Financial Services, the recent growth of identity theft and other forms of electronic fraud make it harder to send documents or information safely via traditional mail, e-mail and websites. Even with password protection, he says, fraudsters can hack into these systems to access customer information.

eLynx has enhanced its e-collaboration platform dubbed expedite to provide workflow capabilities lenders can use to manage loan processing and documentation electronically throughout the loan's entire lifecycle. The new release is based on feedback from lender customers and is available to all eLynx customers who utilize the eLynx expedite platform. The new enhancements are part of expedite and are built into electronic loan folders. As documents within the folder change or new documents are added, appropriate parties can be notified as work is queued up. All loan related information is stored securely in a centralized location, including detailed notes about loan-level and document-level status changes that do not necessarily reside on traditional mortgage documentation. The system protects all sensitive data by making it easy to control who has access. A complete audit trail provides loan history and progress at every point in the loan lifecycle. In addition to improving process workflow, usability and individual workflow enhancements were also made for this new release.

In order to help overburdened servicers, Overture Technologies has launched Mozart for Special Servicing to help servicers automate and get borrowers in the right mod the first time around. The new tool leverages Overture Technologies' automated decisioning technology used in mortgage underwriting in a process called, "automated re-decisioning," applying a rules system to re-evaluate risk and value of a loan at any point along the mortgage value chain. Mozart for Special Servicing enables servicers to align the interests of borrowers, bankers, secondary markets, investors and other third parties at the beginning of the loan modification process, as well as keep up with changing policies and requirements. The application maintains consistent, defensible, and transparent, processes, levels of discretion and approval practices, calculations and agreed upon outcomes for every loan, regardless of spikes in volume and industry booms. It also provide tailored workout options at the loan level, while still making it easy for Special Servicing operations to scale up to meet the volume of today's crisis. Lastly, the technology leverages existing infrastructure, and integrates with legacy systems and other data facilities.

The electronic registry for tracking ownership of mortgage loans and servicing rights has been expanded to allow the registration of loans where MERS is not the mortgagee of record. These "information only" registrations are being called MERS iRegistrations, and they give members the anti-fraud and tracking benefits of a "MERS as original mortgagee" registration without naming MERS as the mortgagee. The iRegistration procedure can be used to register a loan prior to closing, MERS said. The MERS website is www.mersinc.com.

Phoenix Capital, a Denver-based provider of mortgage servicing analytics, consulting and brokerage services, will begin using Compass's CompassPoint technology in determining the value of mortgage servicing rights. CompassPoint will be used by Phoenix as the cash flow engine and model with which Phoenix applies its market color and assumptions to generate valuations and analytics for MSR portfolios. The two companies said the transition to the Compass technology should be complete by the end of this month.

California's Nevada and Placer counties have selected Lender Processing Services Inc.'s Aptitude Solutions' division to provide a software solution that further automates and streamlines land recording and indexing for both counties. OnCore, Aptitude Solutions' recording and indexing platform enables county governments of all sizes to reduce internal paperwork and easily manage workflow by electronically moving document images through the recording process, rather than through traditional manual and paper-intensive processes. OnCore's features include electronic recording, automatic document queuing, electronic digital stamping, historic image back posting, full accounting functionality. Nevada County will become the first county in California to implement Aptitude Solutions' OnCore platform for electronic land records indexing and e-recording. Placer County also plans to implement the OnCore platform to handle high-volume recording and to provide increased automation and detailed audit checks.

Avista Solutions has integrated the Avista Agile loan origination system with DocMagic, a loan document solution provider. The integration to DocMagic streamlines the loan document production process for Avista Solutions customers, giving Avista customers access to DocMagic's e-disclosure and e-sign features. DocMagic's interface with Avista's Agile LOS is a direct interface. DocMagic's e-disclosure feature allows lenders to deliver and get receipt confirmations of disclosure documents via e-mail. DocMagic monitors the entire e-disclosure process, notifying lenders when borrowers view their documents and mailing printed copies of the documents to borrowers if they fail to view them electronically within 48 hours.

ISGN has purchased Richmond Title Services, Plano, Texas, as part of its title business cross-sell strategy. RTS is one of the top 25 independent title agents in the US and has more than 40 employees. According to ISGN, the plan is to cross-sell RTS's services to existing ISGN customers as well as through ISGN's e-services platform, Lenstar, Bridgelink and the MORvision Plug-in Partner Network. A plug-in will be written for all Dynatek MORvision customers. ISGN said in a prepared statement that the acquisition will help ISGN gain market share in the title business by leveraging ISGN's knowledge process outsourcing onshore and offshore processing capabilities. No sale price was disclosed.