Womply & the government
Womply was among the private partners working hardest to stop PPP fraud.
Throughout the Paycheck Protection Program, Womply worked hand in hand with the federal government to expand access for the smallest businesses and to combat fraud. It was a technology company, not a lender: it never underwrote, approved, or funded a loan. But it reported fraud early and often, and gave investigators the records to prosecute it.
Reporting fraud to the government
Womply did not wait to be asked. Through 2021 it proactively reported fraud and pressed for stronger safeguards:
- On April 30, 2021 it sent the SBA, its Office of Inspector General, and the Department of Homeland Security a file of roughly 5,000 fraudulent applications tied to organized rings, described as “the first of many such files,” and opened a working relationship with the FBI.
- In May 2021 it gave the SBA a list of 13,798 loans tied to compromised identities, so those identifiers could be blocked from reuse across COVID-relief programs.
- Working with receiving banks, it helped freeze more than $6 million in suspected-fraud disbursements, and filed a formal complaint with the SBA Inspector General.
- It urged the program to verify self-certified income against IRS records and to require IRS Form 4506-T from every applicant, a safeguard that would catch falsified tax documents before money went out the door.
Giving investigators a court-admissible record
From 2021 to 2024 Womply answered legal process from at least 48 federal, state, and local agencies, including the FBI, DOJ, IRS, Secret Service, Homeland Security, and the SBA Inspector General, in more than 370 separate productions of court-admissible records. In one export on May 5, 2021, it proactively gave DHS 2.9 million identity and IP records covering about 1.47 million applications, to help investigators identify and stop further fraud.
Those records held up. Federal prosecutors in more than ten districts introduced Womply’s records as certified business records, authenticated alongside the SBA and major banks, and no defense challenged their reliability. In one trial, the login and upload logs disproved a defendant’s sworn testimony that he “didn’t fill out anything.”
Examined, and upheld
Womply’s role was later examined and upheld. A federal court (2022) and an arbitration final award (2024) both found it a technology provider, not a lender or loan underwriter, with no adverse findings against it.
The May 2021 fraud-prevention memo → Government data-sharing fact sheet → Government investigation support →See the full dated 2020–2021 timeline & all 28 source notes →
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