Automated Global Background Checks Enable Faster, Smarter Hiring

As many organizations have discovered, hiring across borders unlocks access to top talent, but it also brings added complexity. Competition for talent remains intense, and at the same time, you must successfully navigate complex regional hiring regulations. However, as highlighted in First Advantage’s 2025 Global Trends Report, automated global background checks are helping employers overcome these hurdles, making it easier to hire and onboard faster, while also supporting cross-border compliance.

Advanced global talent screening technology, combined with the right provider, empowers smarter hiring decisions and helps you compete more effectively for talent, anytime and anywhere.

Balancing Screening Priorities in Fast-Moving Talent Markets

As your organization expands internationally, a critical question arises: How do you screen quickly enough to hire the best candidates without running into regional compliance issues or compromising quality? After all, there’s an assumption that faster background checks can reduce time-to-hire and lower costs, but if they lack depth, they can increase your exposure to hiring risk. On the other hand, more thorough checks can increase screening expenses but potentially slow down onboarding, which can cause you to lose candidates to faster-moving competitors.

This challenge is reflected in our Trends Report, where 48% of global employers now rank speed as their top screening priority. Additionally, 68% say the applicant experience sets the tone for the entire employment journey, underscoring the importance of screening speed in shaping a strong employee experience.

These findings come to life in regions where hiring speed has a direct impact on business outcomes. For example, in India and China, where 55% of customers cite speed as their top priority, delays in the hiring process can mean the difference between filling critical roles and falling behind in key markets. The trick is to shrink the delays without compromising in other areas. This is possible when you work with a screening provider that possesses the expertise and technology to help you strike the right balance of speed, risk, and cost in alignment with your hiring goals.

Automation Fuels More Efficient Screening

Our trends report reveals the many ways automated global background checks have accelerated turnaround times across several key screening categories, including criminal background checks, education and employment verifications, and identity verification. In Canada, for example, automation propelled employment verifications to turnaround times 24% faster than the global average, while education verifications were 41% faster. In the UK, the adoption of First Advantage’s Digital ID has led to a 45% faster turnaround time for criminal record checks. More than half of applicants there now use touchless digital identification, streamlining the process for both candidates and employers.

In regions where identity fraud and proxy interviews are on the rise, automated identity solutions are helping organizations verify applicants earlier in the process, reducing downstream delays and improving screening reporting. As discussed in a recent FA Live! episode, identity-related threats such as deepfake videos and impersonation during interviews are becoming increasingly common and sophisticated.

First Advantage customers are mitigating these risks across regions by adopting identity fraud solutions that leverage a range of capabilities, including multi-layered identity verification, ID card hologram analysis, and liveness detection using selfie videos.

Compliance Without Compromise

As your organization scales globally, compliance challenges can quickly multiply. Even small missteps can potentially result in hiring delays, reputational risk, or legal exposure. Beyond country-specific data privacy regulations, you may also face restrictions around the scope of employment screening and varying documentation standards. Given this, it’s not surprising that 37% of global survey respondents in the trends report cited regulatory compliance as the primary reason for conducting background checks, ranking it above other considerations such as evaluating future risk, ensuring job qualifications, and protecting brand reputation. Notably, in the EMEA region, the number is even higher, at 59%. As always, while we can’t offer legal advice, we suggest you confer closely with your counsel to determine your hiring policy at the local, national, or international scope.

It’s vital to partner with a screening vendor with global reach and deep market expertise allowing customers to tailor their screening programs to meet local requirements while maintaining a consistent global hiring standard. For example, whether navigating government ID discrepancies in Singapore or optimizing criminal record checks in the UK, First Advantage can help your organization meet your compliance goals without slowing down hiring processes. Best of all, automation can also be used judiciously as part of ongoing process enhancements.

Transforming Global Hiring Through Innovation

As organizations expand across borders, background screening continues to evolve in close step with this growth. Our 2025 Global Trends Report highlights the transformative impact of automation and its role in enabling fast screening that supports compliance, ultimately creating a better experience for candidates and employers alike.

Looking ahead, automation will continue to reshape how organizations hire, onboard, and monitor talent. From identity solutions to automated verifications, further innovation promises faster results and more adaptive screening processes. Embracing these advancements today can position your organization to compete more effectively for top talent tomorrow. First Advantage is here to help you turn innovation into action.

Download the 2025 Trends Report and see how we’re helping to transform multinational hiring practices for organizations like yours.