Biometric authentication in the New Banking world
May 31, 2018
May 31, 2018
Biometric authentication is nothing new for banks. Fingerprint scanners are an example of a commonly accepted form of password-less authentication. But with fraud on the rise, banks must find a better way of managing authentication systems.
The challenge is to manage authenticators and meet compliance standards without being tied to any particular vendor or modality. Accenture believes the solution is an "authentication hub" that can:
Driven by Payment Services Directive 2 (PSD2) regulations, a rise in payment fraud and client expectations to improve the customer experience, biometric authentication is being widely pursued in the financial services sector.
Essentially, with biometiric authentication, banks can save time and money while fighting fraud
The idea of an authentication hub will allow customers to sign on to accounts seamlessly using one authentication method. Banking customers can now use biometric authentication at ATMs, and some are also pioneering new authentication methods, such as social login. A single, simple interface would eliminate the need for customers to authenticate on individual applications.
This new type of authentication platform would facilitate multi-factor and multi-modal authentication and use data from transactions, risk and fraud systems to make informed decisions about what the customer can do. Because the framework only needs to be integrated once to provide access to all the authenticators, it is easy to reuse them for many business functions—such as transaction authorization, third-party access via APIs or cross-channel authentication from branches or contact centers.
Components of the authentication hub explained:
Mobile Know Your Customer (mKYC) technology to facilitate identification and verification for digital user enrollment and account sign-up
Biometric Authentication Framework to integrate biometric authenticators, such as voice and fingerprints
Pick and choose authenticators that allow users to nominate how they authenticate within acceptable security baselines, including the ability to plug and play legacy authenticators, such as OTPs, PINs and pattern drawing; as needed
Risk engine aligned to fraud, and that provide information and context on users, behaviors, devices and transactions
Signing in the New with both tactical and strategic solution to eliminate wet signature in both the short and long term
Banks must define how biometric authentication will help them reach their objectives. Biometric technology in smartphones and wearables offer many new authentication capabilities that can seamlessly work together through the Authentication Hub. An omni-channel vision can help firms determine which authenticators are most useful. These will be deployed on a flexible, compliance and secure architecture via a hybrid approach to take advantage of the benefits of both a centralized server environment and on-device security.
In addition to giving the business more choice, a flexible hub architecture also provides much greater consumer choice by allowing end users to select their preferred means of authentication—within the risk guidelines defined by the hub.
PINs, passwords
Smartphone, card reader
Biometric factors
Geolocation, travel time
Typing, swiping, device usage
Payment values, recipients, patterns
Deploying an Authentication Hub requires careful consideration and a vision for how authenticators can be reused to solve wider business problems, such as document signing and transaction authorization. Now is the ideal time for firms to explore how this technology can help them improve customer service and cybersecurity. Read the report to learn more about the technical capabilities and use cases for the Authentication Hub.
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