August 6, 2021
Banks across the world realize that failure to maintain tight anti-money laundering frameworks may result in potential regulatory action. Many need to take urgent steps toward securing their AML and financial crime management.
iProov can help banks with AML and other fraud protection. Our remote facial biometric verification technology enables banks to verify that an online user is the right person (i.e, that the user matches the image from a trusted photo ID), a real person (not a photograph or video used in a presentation attack) and that the authentication is taking place right now (not a digitally injected attack).
How Does iProov’s Biometric Technology Help Retail Banks Protect Against Online Money Laundering?
Part 1: Customer verification during online onboarding
Verifying the identity of a new remote customer is the first and most crucial step in a bank’s online anti-money laundering efforts. It’s how banks ensure that they’re engaging with a legitimate individual from the beginning, which enables you to filter out potential bad actors, bots, and fraudulent identities straight away.
The UN estimates that the amount of money laundered globally each year is 2 – 5% of the world’s GDP. Fines are common: in total, global penalties for non-compliance with AML regulations totaled $36bn between 2008-2020. Verifying and enrolling your customers in a way that complies with regulatory guidelines is essential.
iProov’s simple-to-use, inclusive facial biometric technology enables you to verify each and every remote customer with the highest level of assurance. With Dynamic Liveness, retail banks can ask new customers to complete a brief and effortless facial scan during the online onboarding process. This confirms that a remote individual is who they claim to be, by verifying their physical face against the image in their photo ID.
This helps banks to:
- Reduce the time and cost involved in onboarding new customers. iProov technology replaces manual verification to increase accuracy and reduce costs. It also speeds up the process, enabling customers to quickly get access to their new accounts, while maintaining high levels of security. This helps to maximize customer completion rates and reduce drop-off during application.
- Mitigate the risk of fraud and financial crime. iProov enables you to ensure that new customers are who they say they are.
- Reduce the risk of compliance penalties and reputational damage from negative publicity. iProov enables banks to meet regulatory guidelines while reassuring customers and protecting the organization’s reputation.
Part 2: Ongoing authentication
Once you have verified a customer during onboarding, the customer will also need to authenticate themselves on an ongoing basis when they access their account online or make transactions.
An account could be created and verified legitimately, but then be compromised through account takeover fraud, identity theft, phishing, or other activity. Biometric face authentication ensures that the person trying to access an account (the ‘visitor’) is the same person that created the account (the ‘owner’).
iProov also provides banks with flexible authentication. A returning online customer who wants to check a balance or complete another lower-risk activity can use Express Liveness to authenticate. A brief face scan verifies the person is the right person and a real person.
But if that customer wants to complete a higher-risk transaction—for example, transfer money to a new payee, change a PIN, or request a new debit or credit card—iProov Dynamic Liveness can be used to provide additional security against fraud.
Money Laundering in Retail Banking: Why Is Face Biometric Verification Needed?
When criminals need to ‘wash’ dirty money through financial systems, they’ll use several methods to try to avoid detection. A few examples:
Scenario 1: Account Takeover
A criminal gains access to a legitimate bank account. They may have gained access to a real person’s account in a number of ways, such as credential cracking, phishing, or malware. Once they have full control of the compromised account, the fraudster then uses it to channel or ‘layer’ transactions, which obfuscates stolen money and conceals their criminal origins by passing money through multiple ‘legitimate’ transactions. The legitimate account owner may never notice, as the money simply passes through. Or when they do notice, it’s likely too late.
Scenario 2: Synthetic Identity Fraud and Account Creation
Rather than taking over an existing account, a criminal creates a completely new account with a bank. They go through the entire onboarding process using a ‘synthetic identity’. This is done by creating identities using a blend of fake, real, and stolen data — such as an address, phone number, or utility bill — to create a ‘person’ who doesn’t exist. Criminals can then launder money through this new account, which for all intents and purposes looks like a real account to the bank, with real transactions.
Scenario 3: Money Mules
A foreign university student sets up a legitimate bank account in the UK. When their studies finish, they return home. They are then contacted by a criminal who offers to purchase the account from them. The fraudster then uses this legitimate account to move money from account A to account B. In return, the student gets a monetary reward. This is a serious offense and form of money-muling: people agreeing to transfer money in and out of a legitimate bank account on behalf of criminals, either knowingly or unknowingly. This type of fraud has grown exponentially during COVID-19, particularly targeting younger age groups.
These are just a few of the ways that criminals and fraudsters can use financial institutions to launder money.
iProov’s remote face verification technology helps banks mitigate these risks of money laundering in several ways:
- Preventing unauthorized account access and account takeover: iProov’s face biometric security ensures that only the legitimate account holder can access their account. A criminal can steal passwords or mobile devices (or other knowledge or possession-based security factors) but they can’t steal a face. They can copy a face, using a photo, mask, or deepfake, but iProov’s Dynamic Liveness is designed specifically to detect spoof attacks. With iProov, only the verified account holder, determined during the onboarding process, can log in and authorize transactions.
- Detecting synthetic IDs at the point of onboarding: iProov verifies a new customer’s face against a trusted ID document during the onboarding process. If the physical face of the remote customer doesn’t match the ID document that is being provided, the application can be prevented. This protects against synthetic identity fraud, impersonation, and applications by bots or other new account fraud.
- Preventing fraudulent payments: High-risk transactions can be flagged so that the user can be authenticated using Dynamic Liveness. This ensures that activity is legitimate, preventing fraudulent payments in real time.
- Protecting against money mules: Secure biometric verification and authentication from iProov can also protect against some money mule activities. For example, iProov can prevent legitimate customers’ accounts from being used as money mules without their knowledge, as the person using the account wouldn’t ‘match’ the face biometric of the legitimate owner.
How iProov Can Help: Case Studies in Banking
We’re working with several banks around the world to verify and authenticate customers online, helping to deliver AML and KYC compliance. These include:
- Knab
- Rabobank
- ING
You can view all of our case studies here
A Summary: Biometrics for Anti-money Laundering and Financial Crime Control
- The FCA issued an open letter to UK retail bank chief executives highlighting weak financial crime controls and AML compliance in the sector
- iProov can help banks to prevent money laundering and other financial crime.
- iProov’s Dynamic Liveness technology uses face verification and authentication to enable banks to deliver security, compliance with regulations, and maximum completion rates while ensuring an effortless and reassuring user experience
If you’d like to see how iProov’s Dynamic Liveness technology can secure and streamline your customer onboarding and authentication processes, book an iProov demo here.
Alternatively, you can read more on iProov’s work with financial services organizations and on KYC compliance.
