Category: Payment

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Is Real-Time Payment the future of payments?

real-time payment

The “Real-Time Payments (RTP)” system from the US Clearing House is expected to disrupt the financial landscape in 2021. While the latest payment system was launched in 2017, it may seem like that it can change the financial industry. As of right now, the network reaches 56% of US direct deposit accounts. So why do financial institutions think that RTP can change payments in 2021?

What Is Real-Time Payment?

There’s a lot to understand about real-time payments. Real-Time Payments or “RTP” refers to payment networks or a network that is used to make the payment. The hint is in the name, the payments happen in real-time, unlike ACH Payment processing time. These payments are initiated, cleared, and settled within seconds, thus causing the payments to be instantaneous. Real-time payment networks operate 24x7x365, this allows users to initiate the payment anytime and the payment will be cleared within seconds. For payments to happen 24×7, banks and credit unions will need to have a 24×7 backend system. 

“Open-Loop” is an important part of real-time payments, which allows the payment to go directly into the person’s bank instead of relying on a prepaid balance. Without a clear and nuanced data-rich method, it’ll be tough to reduce payment errors.

How Does Real-Time Payment Work?

Real-time payment is the first new payment system in the U.S in the last 40 years. And it enhances the payment method dramatically, including initiating, settling, and reconciliation. All the process of payment processing happens within seconds. 

What makes real-time payment so fast is that it combines immediate fund availability, settlement finality, instant confirmation, and integrated information flows that ensure payments are made within seconds. This is the simple way of how does real-time payment works?

What’s Special about RTP?

The RTP is the only payment system in the US that offers instant and cheap money transfers. In short, currently, businesses operating under the financial industry have to choose between speed and cost in providing payments. Fast payments are possible with credit/debit cards or wire transfers but customers have to pay the huge fee by choosing those options. Cheaper methods like ACH transactions and paper checks are slow and inefficient. 

RTP is a payment system that allows businesses to separate themselves from the current catch-22. The fee for RTP is pretty low, at $0.045 per transfer, and transactions are completed in seconds 24/7. This is significantly faster than credit card payments or wire transfers at a fraction of the cost for financial institutions. 

What’s even more important is that RTP comes with an increased level of security, thus improving the fraud prevention techniques. Merchants also get the benefit of guaranteed payments without worrying about chargebacks.

The Real-Time payment systems support all types of transactions (P2P, B2B, B2C, C2B), consumers, businesses, governments, and all other entities can use RTP. Finally, RTP offers better communication during transactions, which means real-time messaging between the receiver and sender, which can be helpful in reducing fraud in the internet age.

Why is RTP Not Widely Used?

So, even after these features why is RTP not the standard practice in the industry? While there are complex reasons for this, there are two major factors. 

Firstly, it’s the lack of incentives. Up until 2020, there weren’t many incentives to use alternative payment methods to paper checks and cash. However, the pandemic has increased the demand for new contactless payment methods. The most popular methods currently are debit and credit cards, however, after months of continuous use, financial institutions have understood that card fees aren’t worth the convenience. Because of this, financial institutions will focus more on trying out new payment methods like RTP.

Secondly, it is difficult to integrate. While businesses can integrate payments directly into their systems, they need to integrate with each bank individually. As the US has more than 4,000 banks, RTP integration is almost impossible for small to medium-sized banks. For RTP to become standard in the industry, there needs to be a simpler and more unified solution. Thoroughly understanding real-time payments is the way to make the payment system standard.

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5 Strategies Businesses Can Use to Prevent Digital Payments Fraud

digital payment frauds

Digital payments have grown at an exponential rate since the pandemic changed the banking industry into a digital-first. To prevent and detect digital payments frauds, today’s finance and regulatory teams can use a series of tools and technologies. Combining these strategies with techniques like IP whitelisting, VPNs, corporate firewalls and antivirus solutions can allow businesses to build strong digital payment fraud prevention techniques. Here are all the best practices to follow to prevent digital payments fraud.

Physical Payments Fraud: A Gateway to Digital Payments Fraud

Preventing payments fraud is a major priority for financial institutions, and the level of sophistication that fraudsters use makes it almost impossible for financial institutions to uncover and prevent fraud. 

Most of the time, it’s a ransomware-style takeover of a company’s payment systems or the subversive use of credentials to extract funds. The modern era of corporate fraud is being done using digital channels only. 

Digital payment frauds are especially worrisome for banks because the level of sophistication is greater than check fraud or small-level cash fraud, and these digital-first frauds are causing more loss than other types of fraud. A study conducted in 2016 stated that the average loss a financial institution faces during check fraud was only $1,500 compared to almost $130,000 and $1-10 million for account takeover fraud.

The fact that digital payments fraud tends to offer a better payout for criminals, however, there are other factors behind the shift to digital payments fraud. 

For instance, as B2B digital payments have become mainstream, the shift to electronic payment solutions has made it possible for tech-savvy criminals to target companies. Not all customers use physical cash and checks so conducting fraud using these is no longer profitable for businesses. 

Now that customers are using ACH, wire transfers and cards, and even cryptocurrencies, fraudsters love to conduct fraud digitally. The widespread use of mobile payment apps and online banking software are all working in the favor of a criminal. 

Even with today’s heightened sophistication and the rising prominence of remote work, most of the losses suffered by financial institutions are due to gaps in their own compliance or security gaps. Also, the lack of proper employee training of the company’s digital security solutions can also lead to an increased level of fraud. This is why banks and financial institutions need to figure out a way to protect against digital payments fraud.

Structured and Multi-level Approach to Digital Payments Frauds Prevention

Thankfully, just as criminals introduced new frauds, cybersecurity firms, and global payments are working around the clock to develop safer and more robust solutions. Today, most financial institutions utilize a wide variety of tools right alongside each other to ensure complete security.

Solutions like IP Whitelisting and multifactor authentication, VPNs, standard firewalls, and antivirus solutions may be essential for digital security. 

Given the fact that most digital payments are extremely complex, there is no single layer of security that can block every fraudulent attack. To completely prevent digital payments fraud, financial institutions must use a structured and multilayered approach. By implementing multiple layers of security, financial institutions can find the ideal balance. 

So, ultimately what are the most advanced tools and techniques that can help in preventing digital payments fraud in 2021?

Five Major Ways to Protect Against Digital Payments Fraud

1. Regular & Intensive Employee Training

One of the best ways for digital payment fraud prevention is by training your employees. Fraudsters have evolved with time and they utilize the best solutions to stay out of the regulatory body’s eyesight. 

Digital solutions work well only if the employees are operating at 100% efficiency. For instance, if an employee forgets to utilize multi-factor authentication on customer accounts or forgets to delete an old employee’s credentials from the payments system, companies can be exposed to a certain level of risk. If a number of employees are negligent in following company policies, the threat of loss is huge.

Companies have to develop strong internal strategies to ensure that the employees are regularly and constantly educated about the policies and strategies. This education has to cover all the information about growing fraud trends and best practices used to prevent these types of fraud. Teaching customers about the practices in use to detect and prevent these frauds can be extremely helpful.

2. Multi-Factor Authentication

Multi-factor authentication is one of the most secure methods of preventing digital fraud as it is incredibly fast and effective in preventing a fraudulent takeover of customer credentials. 

Criminals can’t utilize stolen credentials as multi-factor authentication requires authorization for making any kind of payment. This could include something that a user knows (passwords), something a user has (a security token), or something a user is (biometrics authentication). In practice, this means that instead of only earning a username and password, employees may be required to submit a fingerprint scan or enter a string of code that is sent to customers via text whenever they try to transact. 

MFA is a tool that is used majorly in the financial industry. To prevent digital payments fraud, MFA is essential. 

3. Multi-User Payments Control

Financial institutions shouldn’t allow a fraudster or a rogue employee to exploit the user credentials to access a payment solution. There are a series of preventive measures that can be used to stop them from deploying funds. To prevent that from happening, dual controls are necessary. 

Dual-controls have been used by financial institutions for ages, and it ensures that the authority to execute a transaction between employees is cut in half. This prevents a single rogue employee from acting on their own. By ensuring that 2-3 employees are required to review every single payment before it’s executed is the best way to prevent fraud.

Financial institutions can assign specific users to initiate and review and approve the truncations that happen in their internal payments systems. Banks and financial institutions can prevent any single employee from having authority over the payments process. 

4. Customer Authentication Software

Another method of preventing fraud is by using transaction monitoring solutions. User auditing software has become a vital part of many financial institutions as it can keep a complete log of every single action. This way, administrators, auditors, and compliance teams have complete transparency in evaluating potential fraudulent actions that happen on any specific user account. 

In situations where fraud has happened, administrators are alerted of suspicious activities and these activity logs can help in training employees for future situations of fraud. Online document verification software helps in ensuring that fraudsters don’t access the financial institution’s internal systems. By proactively preventing customers from entering the systems, fraud can be prevented even further.

5. Payment Safelists and Blocklists

Another way to prevent digital payment fraud is by implementing a safelist and blocklist. These controls can be configured directly within various internal platforms that offer them, and they work by placing internal parameters over which internal bank accounts can be used to send payments. 

Payment safelists and blocklists are incredibly helpful as they give companies total control over individuals and entities that are allowed to engage with the business. Thus helping in digital payment fraud prevention.

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Best Practices to Prevent Credit Card Fraud

credit card fraud prevention

Credit card fraud was the most frequent type of fraud reported in 2020 according to the Federal Trade Commission. And the amount lost annually to credit card fraud is a staggering $149 million. While it’s vital to ensure the security of their financial accounts, if you do end up being a victim of credit card fraud then you should know what to do next. And what would be the best practices for credit card fraud prevention?

What is Credit Card Fraud?

Credit card fraud is when a fraudster uses credit cards without the authorization of the card owner. They can use it to purchase products/services or obtain funds without the cardholder’s consent.

Difference Between Credit Card Fraud vs. Identity Theft

Both of these types of fraud are similar, but identity fraud is broader in reach. An identity thief steals your personal information, such as your Social Security Number, Opens a new account, gets a loan approved, and files for tax returns.

Credit card fraud is a different type of identity theft that happens when your credit card is used for unauthorized purchases. Customers who rarely check their credit card account online may notice some anomalies in the account that you didn’t make. While the majority of credit card issuers offer zero liability on fraudulent purchases, it doesn’t mean that you will turn a blind eye. This also raises the question of how banks prevent credit card fraud.

There are no particular credit card fraud prevention strategies that provide you total credit card fraud protection, but some small actions can lead to an increased risk of fraud, thus you should take time out of your schedule to learn how to secure yourself.

How Consumers Can Prevent Credit Card Fraud?

There are several methods and techniques that fraudsters utilize to steal your personally identifiable information. Fraud reports for 2020 increased over the previous year which isn’t surprising because most of the world went towards a digital transformation. Bad actors always look forward to weak moments for a customer to steal personal information.

Sometimes, being aware of the red flags and things that seem suspicious will help you make better decisions and avoid credit card fraud. Here are some common things to look out for:

1. Don’t Use Unsecure Websites

This is something that you can easily do. If any shopping site is secure you’ll see a padlock on the top left side before the address bar. Also, the web address will begin with HTTPS. Do not enter credit card numbers on a website that you see isn’t secure. And let’s be honest, if a business isn’t offering data security, you shouldn’t invest your time in it. Not using insecure websites is the primary credit card fraud prevention.

2. Beware of Phishing Scams

Phishing scams are very common and they can happen on the phone, email, texts, or anywhere else. The scammers might call and pretend they are from some government body and try to gather your personal information.

Scams as of today are very sophisticated, customers often get scam emails from what seems like their bank. If the email requests you reply with your credit card account number, you know it’s fake.

3. Beware of What You Post on Social Media

While social media is extremely exciting, it does have its downfalls. Fraudsters keep deriving new methods of stealing personal information through social media. Kids often end up sharing sensitive data on social media without being aware of it. To prevent credit card fraud, parents need to have a serious talk about what they share on social media. 

Anything you post about your personal life can be pieced together by fraudsters to build a profile for financial fraud.

4. Use Mobile Payment Apps

There are some chances that your card information may be skimmed by an in-store card reader, but it can still happen. Thus, it is better to increase the protection of credit cards by using mobile payment apps such as PayPal.

All the mobile payment apps use a technology named tokenization, which allows you to pay without exposing the actual card number. This way, your account stays safe from fraudsters even if the transaction data is exposed.

5. Don’t Save Credit Card Information Online

This may take some time to master, you have to stop, find your credit card number, and type it in every time you wish to make a transaction. It doesn’t matter if it’s a retailer that you trust, a data breach can put your private information at risk. This is an effective method of decreasing the risk of fraud.

6. Use a Password Manager

One of the primary rules with using passwords is that you shouldn’t use the same password or a combination of the same passwords over and over again. If a fraudster gets access to one of your passwords, then they’ll be able to gain access to all your accounts.

A password manager can help you generate and remember complicated passwords easily. Having a variety of complicated passwords can assist you in saving yourself from financial fraud.

7. Don’t Use Public WiFi for Financial Transactions

Public WiFi is riddled with fraudsters, trying to steal any information that they can find. If you conduct any kind of financial transaction on public WiFi, you’ll be vulnerable to hackers because these networks are often unencrypted. Whatever financial transactions you need to conduct you should do it on your personal network.

You can also use a virtual private network or VPN to encrypt the public WiFi. A VPN encrypts your incoming and outgoing traffic thus securing the transactions.

How Businesses Can Prevent Credit Card Fraud?

1. Secure Payment Processing

Almost all businesses should have secure payment processing systems. The best options are to use systems that rely on tokenization and encryption to protect sensitive card information during transactions and reduce the risk of data breaches. 

2. EMV Chip Card Technology

Another fraud prevention method is the use of EMV chip cards. Adopting EMV-compliant payment systems can reduce the risk of payment fraud. Chip cards are tougher to copy than magnetic stripe cards. 

3. Address Verification and CVV Checks

Using address verification checks and CVV checks can significantly reduce the number of card-not-present frauds and minimize the risk of fraud.

4. Fraud Detection Tools

Businesses that onboard a lot of customers globally need the help of fraud prevention tools. Technologies like DIRO business verification, online document verification, and utility bill verification can help businesses differentiate between legitimate and fake customers.

5. Employee Training

It is essential to educate your employees to recognize and prevent fraud. If your employees know something is fishy, they can minimize the risk of fraudulent activity, especially in retail environments.

6. Regular Monitoring

Monitoring transactions and customer accounts regularly can help in learning basic fraud patterns and upcoming trends. Identifying patterns is a great way to catch potential fraud early.

7. Chargeback Management

Having a chargeback management process can help businesses track, analyze, and respond to chargebacks. Chargeback fraud can be a major indicator of fraud.

Types of Credit Card Fraud

Credit card fraud can happen in several ways. They’re made specifically to target weak points in payment systems. There are vulnerabilities in each section of a payment system that a fraudster looks to exploit.

Here are some of the most common types of credit card fraud:

  1. Stolen or Lost Credit Cards

As the name suggests, this type of fraud happens when a criminal steals someone else’s physical card. The fraudulent actor then uses the card to make unauthorized purchases. Until the legit owner reports the card as missing or stolen, a fraudster can keep on using the card.

  1. Card-Not-Present (CNP) Fraud

CNP happens when a scammer obtains credit card information (card number, expiration date, or CVV) and uses the card to make illegal transactions. These transactions can be done online, by phone, or by mail without a physical card.

One of the most common ways to obtain card information is through data breaches, phishing, and other methods.

  1. Account Takeover Fraud

Commonly known as ATO, a criminal obtains illegal access to a credit card account or bank account. This is mostly done via ID theft or phishing. Once the account information is obtained, scammers change it, add themselves as authorized users, and request a new card.

They then use the new card to make illegal transactions.

  1. Application Fraud

This type of fraud happens whenever a criminal applies for a credit card using fake information. Once the application is approved and scammers receive the card, they use it for illegal transactions. The legit bank account owner then has to deal with the financial ramifications.

  1. Skimming

Skimming is another type of credit card fraud. Fraudsters use a small electronic device, known as a “Skimmer”. This small device steals credit card information from the card’s magnetic stripe during legitimate transactions. Fraudsters often place these devices at an ATM or a payment terminal.

Criminals can then use the captured data to create counterfeit cards or carry out illegal transactions.

  1. Phishing Scams

These are some of the most common types of credit card fraud. Phishing scams use emails, phone calls, and texts to trick cardholders into revealing their credit card information.

Users receive an email that may look like it’s from a legitimate bank/company/retailer. Most of the time, the motive of the email is to steal the user’s account information.

Emails ask users to “confirm” their account information by clicking a link or a button.

Which Businesses Are Most Susceptible to Credit Card Fraud?

There are specific businesses that are more vulnerable to credit card fraud. Here’s a list of businesses that are more at risk of credit card fraud:

1. eCommerce and Online Retailers

As these businesses conduct CNP transactions, they’re more open to fraud. There’s no way to verify the authenticity of the cardholder, so they’re more exposed to fraud.

Additionally, online transactions are more vulnerable to data breaches, phishing, and malware attacks.

2. Small Businesses

Small businesses don’t have the resources to invest in robust fraud prevention and detection. They don’t even know about the latest developments in credit card fraud trends. This makes small businesses more vulnerable to different types of fraud.

3. High-Risk Industries

Businesses operating in high-risk industries like gambling, adult entertainment, finance, etc tend to experience more instances of fraud. Criminals love to target these industries because the volume of transactions is higher than in other industries.

4. Businesses with High Employee Turnover

Businesses that have a high number of employee turnover are more vulnerable to fraud. Why? Because the consistent shift in employees makes it tough to maintain rules and regulations. There are even cases where employees partake in fraudulent activities due to a lack of procedures.

5. Businesses With Outdated Technology

Retailers that use outdated point of sale (POS) systems or payment terminals are more vulnerable to skimming and other types of fraud.

Older technologies aren’t up to the latest protocols so they’re more susceptible to fraud.

How Banks Can Prevent Credit Card Fraud?

While customers don’t have to bear the burden of credit card fraud, financial institutions have to take the brunt of the fraud. To prevent this type of fraud, FIs need to comply with KYC regulations and AML regulations, continuously monitor the transactions, and utilize technologies.

Technologies such as DIRO online document verification solutions can help financial institutions stay on top of acts of fraud.

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Wire Transfers and Best Practices to Avoid Wire Transfer Fraud

how to avoid wire transfer fraud

All of us have heard the term wire transfer being thrown around in fancy movies and shows. Wire transfer is one of the most popular methods of moving money from one place to another. In actuality, do you know what is wire transfer and how do wire transfer work?

Whether you’re sending the money to family overseas or concluding international business payments, it is vital that you determine if your money is in good hands or not. Wire Transfers are complicated and the more you know about them, the more your business will be safe from the risk of fraud. Businesses need to follow the best practices for wire transfers.

What Is a Wire Transfer?

To put it in simple words, a wire transfer is an electronic method of sending money from one person or business to another business. Using wire transfer, money is transferred from one bank to another one by filling out some basic documents. There are different types of wire transfers and you need to know what are the different types of wire transfers for most efficiency.

How To Send a Wire Transfer?

The easiest way to send a wire transfer is to visit your bank and fill out a form for a wire transfer.

  • The recipient’s name and full address
  • Branch name of the recipient and full address
  • Bank account number of the recipient
  • Recipient bank’s BIC/Swift Code
  • ABA or routing number if the money is being sent to the USA
  • IBAN (International Bank Account Number) if money is being sent to Europe.

What Are The Different Types Of Wire Transfers?

Wire transfers can be of two main types:

  1. Domestic Wire transfer: Where money is sent from one bank to another one within the same country.
  2. International Wire transfer: Money is sent to a bank account that is based out of another country.

Domestic and international wire transfers can further be broken down into two categories:

  1. Intra Bank: In which money is transferred from one account to another one within the same bank.
  2. Inter-Bank: Money is transferred from an account in one bank to an account in another bank. 

How do Wire Transfers Work?

Wire transfers are sent via networks that connect different banks or the same banks. You can think of the network as a middle man between the banks in an electronic money-sending transaction.

They don’t personally handle any money, but instead, they help in sending the international money order from one bank to another one. 

Domestic Wire Transfers:

  1. Intra-Bank: Both the money sender and the receiver belong to the same bank. The bank’s software is instructed to transfer the funds between its accounts or branches. The money is debited from one account and credited to another one. 
  2. Inter–Bank: The one who sends the money and the one who receives the money belong to different banks. The banks are members of a secure, closed network that collects the money and completes the wire transfer by sending it to the desired location. One of the most famous examples of a wire transfer is ACH transactions. 

International Wire Transfers:

  • Intra-Bank: Some big banks have branches in several countries, and smaller banks have accounts of their own in foreign banks. So even in international wire transfers, both the senders and the receivers can have accounts in the same bank.

The SWIFT network is the network that most banks use for these transactions. This means transactions can be completed without needing any intermediary bank.

  • Inter-Bank: Not all banks have their accounts overseas, in this situation, an intermediary bank is used as a middle man. The payment must pass through compliance regulations in the country of the sender, the intermediary bank’s compliance, and the recipient’s compliance. This means inter-bank transactions can take much longer. 

Different types of networks can be used for international inter-bank wire transfers. Some common examples based on the region are Canada & U.S (ACH). Europe (SEPA). India (NEFT/IMPS/RTGS).

What is the Cost of Wire Transfers?

It is common knowledge that wire transfers are expensive, on average the domestic wire transfers cost $25 per transfer but the cost can reach up to $35. 

International wire transfers are even more expensive, they can cost anywhere from $30-$80, at times can cost even more. The worst part is that the person who is receiving money will also have to pay a fee of $10-$15. Wire Transfers are so expensive because of multiple hidden fees that add up throughout the completion of the process.

What’s The Time Taken by Wire Transfers?

Wire Transfers are slowly becoming obsolete, because of the time taken to complete the process. Now that online transfers have become a norm, there’s no real need for wire transfers. 

Domestic wire transfers are said to take just one day, however, they can take more than one business day. When it comes to international wire transfers, it can take 3-5 business days but there have been multiple cases of it taking more than a week. There is a difference in time because wire transfer goes through a domestic network as opposed to international networks that have to clear multiple compliances which adds more time to the process. 

Add in the time difference and different opening times of banks in the destination country, it adds up extra hours/days until the transaction is completed.

Are Wire Transfers Secure?

Wire transfers are secure, but not completely secure. As wire transfers need the recipient’s bank account number and a network (SWIFT) code, any errors in entering this information can send the money to some other account. 

It can take weeks to recover the money or you may never get it back. If your wire transfer has gone through multiple intermediaries, it may be almost impossible to get the money back. Fraudsters have made their way inside wire transfers, fraudsters can pretend to be a legitimate business and once you transfer money to them, it’s impossible to get the money back. There are some practices that you need to learn how to avoid wire transfer fraud.

Can Only Banks Send Wire Transfers?

Some companies that aren’t banks offer wire transfer services, one of the most used services is Western Union. Some people may think that just because they aren’t using a wire transfer, they’re using a better option, in most situations that’s not the case. 

A non-bank-based wire transfer may complete faster, but it will surely cost much more. To make things worse, if you wire a payment to be collected in cash, fraudsters can use identity theft techniques to claim the money.

There are some non-banks or e-wallets that offer digital services where you set up your account which acts as an intermediary between the banks for your wire transfer. PayPal is a common experience that charges a very high percentage of currency conversion while making international payments. 

Best Practices for Preventing Wire Transfer Fraud

Companies that rely on wire transfer fraud need to employ best practices to increase company-wide policies designed to increase employee awareness and prevent wire transfer fraud. Here are some of the wire transfer best practices:

  • Education is vital, learning about email scams and educating your employees is needed to protect your financial assets. 
  • Requests for changes, immediate action, or lack of availability by phone should be handled strictly. Employees need to follow the company process. 
  • Always verify the authenticity of each wire transfer request by using two-factor or multi-factor authentication. Call the person who’s receiving the money, using the same number you used to call before. 
  • Don’t use email for wiring instructions, use physical methods instead like mail, fax, or a phone call. 
  • Carefully verify all the emails that request wire transfers. Emails are one of the most common methods of fraud. Before sending the money, you need to verify who is asking for money and why?
  • Businesses should use encrypted emails that contain sensitive information.
  • If your business insurance policies don’t cover cybercrime fraud, then it’s time to change the policies. 
  • Following KYC compliance is one way to reduce fraud. While it may take time, if you can conduct KYC on new wire transfers, it can lead to fraud reduction for your business. 
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Challenges In Establishing Trust In Growing Digital Banking Payment Systems Globally

trust in digital banking payment system

As time spent online is growing at an exponential rate, the demand for digital services and solutions is at an all-time high. This demand for online services includes the banking sector as well. In the last few years, digital banking or online banking systems have grown rapidly and offer better and more effective solutions than traditional financial institutions.

Switching to digital solutions instead of physical methods of banking can prove to be incredibly convenient as customers can access all banking services 24/7 right from their phones or computers. Digital banking payment systems can reach more people across the globe in comparison to physical banking. With this sudden growth of options and banking, digital banking payment systems have become globally accepted, but one major factor remains, which is “Building trust”.

In this era of technological advancement, digital banking fraud is also growing. How can banks and other financial institutions save themselves from digital banking fraud?

Digital Banking vs Online Banking

Most users think that digital banking and online banking are the same things. The debate of digital banking vs online banking has been going on for a long time. 

Digital banking is a solution where all the aspects of financial-related services are done through digital channels instead of visiting a physical bank. Online banking on the other hand offers only the core features of banking through an app or a website. 

Digital banking digitizes every activity of the bank undertaken by the customers. Digital banking represents all the activities that can be done through a physical branch, and it offers even more features. 

Challenger Banks vs Neobanks

A challenger bank has both the physical presence of a bank and it also offers complete digital banking solutions. Challenger banks offer both digital banking payment systems and traditional payment methods. Their footprint is significantly smaller in comparison to more widely known traditional banks. 

Neobanks on the other hand, offer a wide range of financial and banking services completely through digital channels. Neobanks are basically a type of FinTechs that operates under a banking license that they either acquired as an independent entity or rented from a bank.

Both Challenger banks and Neobanks focus on improving customer experience and transparency. Their main goal is to offer brilliant services to compete with traditional banks that have a bigger footprint. Knowing their customers and building trust in digital payment systems from the moment of onboarding till their entire lifecycle is a crucial strategy for these types of FinTechs. 

Both of them offer smooth and complete digital account opening facilities. They also keep adopting new technologies to prevent digital banking fraud.

Open Banking Systems

Open banking systems work in favor of customers’ demand for more choices, improved customer experience, and more control over their personal information. This is the system where customers are allowed to access and control their banking or financial accounts through third-party apps.

It prevents digital banking fraud by offering third-party financial services to open accounts, make transactions, and use any other financial data from banks and non-banks with the help of APIs. All of this control helps consumers access products and services across different institutions. These types of banks offer trust in digital banking systems as they employ the best security of technology to prevent digital banking fraud.

Use of Technology To Build Trust In Digital Banking System

A huge percentage of consumers feel that open banking will have a huge impact on how the banking industry works globally. According to several reports and surveys, it is expected that the open banking industry will have a revenue of £7.2bn.

It is expected that Neobanks and others can help in improving the banking industry to a more secure solution. One of the primary reasons these types of banks rely on technology so much is that they lack the resources to compete with traditional banks that have hundreds of thousands of physical branches. As they lack infrastructure, they rely on technology for complete automation of their banking operations, these operations can range from account opening to customer support.

All banks must keep up to date with digital fraud prevention and adopt newer technologies that can help you with digital fraud prevention. If the banks can utilize the right kind of onboarding technologies to reduce friction and improve the efficiency of the whole process with minimal error. Using this, banks can have a strong advantage over their competitors that are still going through the digital transformation process.

To build trust in the digital banking system, these are the most important questions a bank needs to ask:

  • Is this a real person?
  • Is this person who they claim to be?
  • Can I do business with this person?
  • Should I do business with this person?

Complete security and a satisfactory customer experience are vital components for success in the banking sector. Customers have to be able to trust that their personal and financial data is protected by the bank. And the banks who are looking forward to complying with industry regulations and AML practices, need to make sure that the customers are worth trusting from onboarding till the end of the relationship.

If a bank doesn’t have the proper technology, then fraudsters who know their way around technology can manipulate documents and cause millions of dollars worth of losses. FinTechs that make use of identity proofing and AML, KYC, document verification, and biometrics as part of their onboarding process will have a better chance at digital fraud prevention.

Integrated Method to Fight Digital Fraud

It is known that the best way to detect fraud, control, and fight financial crime is during the customer onboarding process. Low-friction KYC technology is important to make sure that the customers won’t abandon the process. 

Despite knowing this, many digital onboarding processes continue to be static and only used during customer acquisition which leaves a lot of room for error. They don’t make use of machine learning and advanced algorithms to identify if a user can be trusted or not and prevent fraud. 

How Does DIRO’s Technology Tackle The Problem?

Trust in the digital banking system is a tricky thing to establish, that’s where DIRO’s award-winning technology comes in. DIRO helps in making the onboarding process faster than ever by using brilliant document verification technology. 

Banks or Financial institutions can make use of the technology to verify if the customer is real or not. This minimizes the risk for fraud prevention, as DIRO document verification can help in following KYC and AML compliance with ease.

The technology offered by DIRO can be used by all kinds of banks, financial institutions, and FinTechs to verify documents in a secure environment. You can easily verify bank statements, address proof, and utility bills. To improve trust in the digital banking system, banks need to utilize this technology.