Global Phone Validate

Global Phone Validate is a web service that allows you to validate phone numbers and obtain additional information related to those numbers.

This web service can be accessed in real-time by submitting a request to the web service endpoint. The service will return a response in JSON format that contains information about the validated phone number. We currently support over 160 countries.

Global Phone Validate is a RESTful API service. REST is a style of software architecture that provides a convenient and consistent approach to requesting and retrieving data.

Global Phone Validate API returns data in JSON format. JSON is a common Internet format that provides a simple method of representing arbitrary data structures. According to json.org, it is a text format that is completely language independent but uses conventions that are familiar to programmers of the C-family of languages, including C, C++, C#, Java, JavaScript, Perl, Python, and many others.

Using Global Phone Validate is as simple as constructing a URL. We support both asynchronous and synchronous communications. Each integration has its own advantages and disadvantages, depending on the usage scenario.

Asynchronous - I want more flexibility.

With asynchronous integration, you can fire your request to the Global Phone Validate service without having to wait for the result to return. The result can be retrieved from the service later, providing more flexibility. 

Note that the result will be removed if it is not accessed within 5 minutes. Also, you may have to make several attempts to retrieve the results if there is a delay in retrieving them back. 

Synchronous - I want the results as soon as possible.

In contrast, with the synchronous integration when a request is fired to the Global Phone Validate service, you will receive your result within the request call itself. Therefore, you have to wait for the request to finish processing before you can continue with the workflow.

You can use our REST sample code for validating address, phone and email data. See Capture sample code guide for details.

Get sample code

We now have pre-configured Postman collections for our APIs.

You can quickly test out the requests and responses and see how the API behaves. Simply import the relevant collections, add your token as a variable and start making requests with your desired parameters.

Get Postman collections

Contact your Experian sales representative to create an account.

An Auth-Token is used to authenticate the service. Your Auth-Token must be specified in the request header or passed as a query parameter in the URL. Find out more about tokens. To view and manage your tokens, log into the Self Service Portal. 

Security

We strongly recommend that you secure your integration to prevent malicious use. 

Depending on your setup, you can specify:

• CORS origin domains
  

  Cross Origin Resource Sharing (CORS) is a specification developed by W3C that allows browsers to make cross-domain requests. When making a request to our service, the browser will add an origin request header. Our service will then respond with a CORS specific response header denoting the origin domains allowed to make requests.
  To secure your integration, specify the origin domains that will have access to your integration. Go to Self Service Portal > Licenses. Click Edit for the required token and enter up to five origin domains.

• Permitted URLs
  If you're integrating your token into a web form, you can also specify the permitted URLs to ensure that only requests from your domains are authenticated. Go to Self Service Portal > Licenses. Click Edit for the required token and enter up to five URLs. See an example of a successful response.

• Whitelisted IPs/IP ranges
  If you're integrating your token to an API service on your server, specify the IP addresses or IP address ranges to ensure that only requests from your servers are authenticated. Go to Self Service Portal > Licenses. Click Edit for the required token and enter up to five IPs/IP ranges. See an example of a successful response. 

With this integration, you can fire your request to the Global Phone Validate service without having to wait for the result to return. The result can be retrieved from the service later, providing more flexibility. 

Note that the result will be removed if it is not accessed within 5 minutes. Also, you may have to make several attempts to retrieve the results if there is a delay in retrieving them back.

Alternative integration: synchronous

How does it work?

The client specifies an action using an HTTP POST followed by an HTTP GET to request the result.

With this integration when a request is fired to the Global Phone Validate service, you will receive your result within the request call itself. Therefore, you have to wait for the request to finish processing before you can continue with the workflow.

Alternative integration: asynchronous

How does it work?

The client specifies an action using an HTTP POST to request the result.