The First Name That Wasn’t
On paper, everything lined up: a Social Security number, a date of birth, even a location that matched one of our client’s participants. The only issue? The name in the obituary didn’t match the one in the client file.
The obituary referred to the deceased as “Sifu” which, at a glance, seemed to present a name mismatch. To most systems, this would appear to be a completely different person.
When Titles Look Like Names
In this case, “Sifu,” a title for a kung fu master, was placed before the individual’s name, giving the impression that it was the person’s first name. For most algorithms, that would be enough to toss the match out. But our team knows better.
We see this all the time—honorifics or titles mistaken for legal names. In obituaries, it’s not unusual to see someone referred to as “Coach,” “Doctor,” or “Reverend”—words that carry respect, but confuse traditional matching logic.
We Know What to Look For
Rather than dismissing the record, our team dug deeper. They cross-referenced address history, familial relationships, and regional details, ultimately confirming that “Sifu” and the individual in the file were, in fact, the same person.
It’s this kind of human insight that elevates our results. Because when the data gets murky and names don’t quite add up, it takes real people, not just programs, to read between the lines.
