The service, which currently focuses on the Australian market, provides basic and advanced authentication processes to confirm student identity, academic qualifications, immigration history and social media use.

“Some [providers] are fully engaged in the risks in the market, and others are completely risk adverse”

“We feel the market is changing in the way they recruit students, there’s an increasing use of technology and direct applications,” PQ director Andrew Durston said.

“We’re there to provide a risk mitigation service in terms of student verification in mixed and high-risk markets.”

Speaking with The PIE News, Durston, who co-founded the company, said PQ sought to fill a gap in the market for risk-averse providers, while also creating a customisable and adaptive service depending on government policy, blending digital with front-line staff.

“Some [providers] are fully engaged in the risks in the market, and others are completely risk-averse, and I understand why some of them might be like that,” he said.

“But risk strategy and risk mitigation elements are often driven by government policy changes and their own commercial interests. Marrying all of those up requires a really coherent risk strategy and a coherent articulation of that strategy.”

Durston added that PQ did not seek to take on the education agent market, but instead provide a viable alternative for providers as student recruitment patterns change.

“A well-run agent program for a university is a very important part of their international strategy. If you’ve got good quality agents providing a good quality service, then we don’t really play in that space,” he said.

Recruitment and admissions staff are increasingly scrutinising students’ online footprint, with one in 10 US staff saying they revoked an offer after viewing a student’s social media use.