banking | Kwik.ID

Minimizing fraud with Video KYC

Financial institutions are mandated by law to carry out KYC to meet strict regulatory guidelines. It not only allows them to understand who their customer is but also functions as a pre-emptive safeguard against any potential illegal transactions.

While carrying out stringent KYC is quite a meticulous process, it is being remedied through the use of Adaptive AI. Wherein technology implements the necessary KYC processes and also incorporates learnings gained by observing the behavior of customers to differentiate between legitimate behavior patterns and suspicious ones.

By automating the KYC process, Video KYC securely verifies identities whilst detecting frauds and spoofing attempts on a real-time basis. This is done via the assimilation of a clear fraud decision-making framework coupled with robust data gathering and analysis. The different types of fraud checks during Video KYC verification are as follows:

Document Tampering: Kwik.ID’s AI based technology enables a quick face match between the selfie & photo on the identity document of the customer to check if the person submitting the documents matches the picture in them to avoid identity theft. Through its access to the central database, it also quickly verifies the legitimacy of the documents.

Further, an inbuilt feature in the video KYC solution checks if the official government ID provided has been tampered with. A risk score is generated to determine the legitimacy of the document. This ensures that the documents provided are the originals and not just a color photocopy.

Location Spoofing: Kwik.ID delivers very robust location intelligence to identify safe customers. At the beginning of Video based KYC identification, the live location (lat/long) of the customer through web browser/mobile is captured and in subsequent steps instant OCR of the POA document is done. Both the locations are fed into the distance algorithm and the address of POA is converted to lat/long. The distance between both location is calculated & if distance < 300 meters (configurable) then the current location gets tagged as HOME LOCATION.

Security Questions: A security question that needs to be answered by the customer undergoing the video KYC is included in this process to ensure that it is a live video session and not a pre-recorded one made by hackers.

All these features are integrated into Kwik.ID’s Video KYC solution to make it a comprehensive AI and data-driven decision-making platform. This will serve as a valuable tool for FIs and other organizations to easily and seamlessly validate actual KYCs from fraudulent ones on a real-time basis.

To know more, reach out to us on info@getkwikid.com

Physical KYC v/s Video KYC – Advantages & Limitations

KYC is essential to verify that the customers are who they claim to be and enables institutes to understand their customers better. This is vital for companies operating in the banking and financial sector that need to adhere to strict KYC and AML (Anti-Money Laundering) norms prescribed by regulatory authorities.

FIs also have to assure their customers that the sensitive personal data they are required to share to complete such procedures are in safe hands. While FIs need to ensure that the people signing up for their services are legitimate and not blacklisted or liable to commit illegal transactions, their clients need to know that their identity documents will not be misused.

Physical KYC requires customers to visit the company’s branch office to submit their identity documents and proof of address. While this is a very secure form of KYC, it is also very time consuming and inconvenient, especially for customers residing in towns where the company does not have a branch office.

Thus, a physical face-to-face KYC is not always a feasible option in a large country like India. So, companies need other alternatives to tap the vast market that exists in tier II and tier III cities and their suburbs.

Video KYC verification (approved method of KYC as per recent regulations) has emerged as a strong contender in recent times to resolve a myriad of KYC operational issues. It is a cost-effective and speedy way for organizations to ensure better customer experience while maintaining requisite process-adherence.

Unlike Digital KYC that still required a visit to the customer’s doorstep or nearest access point, video KYC makes the entire process digital. It not only provides companies remote access to potential customers but has also made the entire process paperless as there is no need for a wet signature. The videos and recordings taken during the KYC are encrypted to ensure data security.

Here are the overall advantages of Video KYC over Physical KYC:

Physical KYC	Video KYC
INR 150+ per application	INR 20-50 per application
8-10 applications per agent per day	100+ application per agent per day
Asynchronous identity check	Real time identity verification
Delayed audit; error prone	Concurrent audit
Outsourced vendor; data risk	On premise; secure – RBI compliant
High training & operational cost	Negligible; on-job prompts
Susceptible to customer, DSA, employee fraud	Extremely potent against fraud

As a fast, regulatory compliant and secure KYC process, video KYC leaves everyone feeling a winner. The additional value generated through cost reduction makes it a must-have in the KYC paraphernalia. However, the only limiting factor of Video KYC is the heavy dependency on network bandwidth. But with the penetration of mobile handsets into every household, coupled with a minimum 4G data offered by telecom operators, this issue can be tackled smoothly.