In the course of 2024, one of the Philippines’ UnionBank will implement speech recognition in the country, starting with its customer service. This will serve as another biometric for digital identity authentication for a better customer service experience. It will also help prevent fraud and scams in online banking. However, UnionBank does not reveal the biometrics vendors it uses, as part of its data privacy statement.
Currently, banks in the Philippines offer facial recognition, fingerprints, and iris scans. Thus, UnionBank is expected to be the first to implement speech recognition once it materializes, via customer service calls before it would be used to take over one’s account.
Moreover, leveraging inherent characteristics unique to an individual, such as voice biometrics, can significantly enhance security.
The voice biometric idea started at the end of 2022 and UnionBank has already finished the proof of concept for the technology which included various factors and conditions that could impact the quality of the voice. This covers changes in voice due to cough or colds, different dialects and accents, as well as the kind of environment a person is in during the call.
In addition, another popular local bank relying on biometric authentication, the Philippine National Bank (PNB), announced one million registered users of the PNB Digital App, an app that uses a digital key soft token with fingerprint and face biometrics.
Along with the Philippines, Malaysia’s residents will be able to try a fully digital banking experience by enrolling through electronic Know Your Customer (eKYC) verification.
Singapore-based GXBank launched its beta digital banking app for an initial customer group of 20,000 Malaysians. Customers will be able to sign up through KYC using a local identification card and a one-time password (OTP). In addition, users will be able to secure accounts with face biometrics. Existing Grab users can access GXBank directly within the former’s app, tech news website TechWireAsia reports.
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