Can biometrics reduce money laundering?

Yes, biometrics can help in the fight against money laundering. In this post we tell you how.

Biometrics, key in the fight against money laundering

Regulatory pressure and the increase in fraud have forced companies, especially financial service providers, to take measures to protect themselves against money laundering and other financial crimes.

In today’s digital world, biometrics is the only technology that can confirm there is a real person behind the process (thanks to liveness detection) and verify the identity of a person remotely in real time.

Biometrics is the branch of study that encompasses the unique and irreplaceable physical and/or behavioral characteristics of each individual. 

Thanks to the biometrics it is possible to guarantee that a user is using their real identity at the time of registration. It allows assigning legal responsibility and eliminating the possibility of using identity documentation of another person or false personal data, since identity verification is associated with biometric characteristics, such as the face or the fingerprint, for example. It is, therefore, a safe and reliable way to demonstrate that the client is who he says he is.

Biometrics helps verify identities remotely, a decisive step in the fight against online money laundering, since it is the only way for entities to confirm that they are dealing with legitimate users.

In addition to protecting the onboarding of new remote clients, biometrics ensures authentication in daily services. For example, let’s imagine that a user has already verified their identity to create an online bank account. Every time that a person wants to access their account, they must authenticate. This biometric authentication guarantees that the owner of the account is the person accessing it (and not a third party, a theft, etc.).

In short, biometrics can help reduce the risks associated with money laundering: 

– Ensuring that only the account holder accesses their data, avoiding unauthorized access and identity theft
– Detecting deepfakes and other types of synthetic attacks, thanks to liveness detection

– Eliminating the possibility of fraudulent payments, since illegitimate users are marked 

⚠️ Remember that money laundering is a crime defined in the Penal Code. The fact that it is completely the order of the day makes it necessary to have tools to counteract it.

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