Merging Digital Identity & Authentication in Banking

The banking sector is going through significant digital transformation, driven by the need for greater efficiencies, customer demands, security requirements, technological innovation, and increasing regulations. On the customer side, account holders are seeking a better customer experience, focused on digital technology and access, especially across mobile devices. On the information side, communications protocols are ensuring data is exchanged and managed properly across the financial ecosystem. Implementing more digital capability creates additional cybersecurity challenges. The huge amount of data created by new digital technologies is a very valuable and attractive target for hackers and criminals. It’s no longer enough for a bank to protect its internal systems and applications—it’s also vital to secure the digital identities of customers. Fraud is growing and becoming more global, so banks need a wide-ranging, objective view of the landscape. Strong authentication is central to identity protection, and introducing additional layers of authorization can help to keep banking customers safe, especially during the onboarding process. Fortunately, the best identity verification and authentication platforms can operate independently or integrate flawlessly with existing banking systems to provide complete protection.

Identification and Verification Requirements Differ Between Countries, but Banks Are Central

From BankID in Nordic countries to blockchain technology in Canada, or KYC in the U.S. to government-driven electronic IDs in Belgium or Estonia, identification models vary widely between different parts of the world. There’s a great deal of interest in comprehensive identity management, from both within and outside the banking sector. This puts banks in a strong position to leverage identity management and authentication technologies, since they:

• Exist at the center of the authentication world.
• Follow strict guidelines and regulations for identifying and authenticating customers.
• Gather many data points to onboard and verify customers.
• Are largely trusted by their customers and the general population.

This ideally places banks as a central point for identification and authentication, allowing them to widen the services they offer. For example, a bank could easily offer identification services for additional payment processing.

Digital Onboarding in Banking Must Be Secure and Efficient

Bringing identity and authentication together increases banking efficiency as well as security. As leaders in authentication and identity management, HID Global is merging these two disciplines and providing a complete, end-to-end technology solution for securing and authenticating a customer’s identity. Digital identity security in banking is already a complex process, so HID Trusted Transactions Suite enhances security, compliance, and authorization across three critical areas:

• Identity verification: HID Identity Verification provides fast and secure onboarding aligned with “Know Your Customer (KYC)” and other regulations.
• Threat and fraud detection: HID Risk Management Solution uses artificial intelligence and machine learning algorithms to detect fraud.
• Multi-factor authentication: HID ActivID™ Authentication Platform offers a broad range of scanning, biometric, and other approaches to authorize access.

Banks can easily tailor authentication methods to specific types of customers or groups of users, providing the right balance of security, speed, cost, regulatory compliance, and convenience.

How HID Trusted Transactions Suite Helps You Identify, Authenticate, and Onboard New Banking Customers

HID Global provides banks with real-time risk profiling technologies that protect banking and customer systems and data against cybercriminals. It offers threat and fraud protection across:

• Established and recent threats
• Online and mobile banking
• All banking transaction systems
• Sensitive applications and data

Our solutions leverage evidence-based capabilities with behavioral biometrics and machine learning to combat the ever-changing threat landscape faced by modern banking security teams, banking applications, and customers. Banks can take advantage of the HID Identity Verification Service to verify customer identities simply, securely, and conveniently. New clients can use a customer-facing app to quickly and easily submit their onboarding material anytime and anywhere. Information submitted by your customer is thoroughly verified and authenticated using a suite of industry-leading identification, verification, and authorization technologies:

• Liveness checks incorporating motion detection and facial gesture recognition
• Facial comparisons using a 50-point biometric facial match
• Document verification, checking up to 75 factors to identify and protect against document tampering or forgery
• Video analysis using additional checks to authenticate identity documents

Banks can easily review, check, and approve client submissions within seconds. The HID Identity Verification Service produces a comprehensive “Customer Due Diligence” report, detailing key client identity information. To learn more, explore our advanced multi-factor authentication solution for banks and financial institutions. Get the latest blogs on identity and access management delivered straight to your inbox. Olivier Thirion de Briel is Global Solutions Marketing Director for the banking sector at HID Global, leading the banking strategy and marketing for IAM solutions. Prior to joining HID Global, he managed the cloud strong authentication offering at VASCO Data Security. He previously managed Oberthur Technology’s strong authentication product line and founded two mobile companies. He holds an MBA from INSEAD, as well as an MSc in computer and electronic science.