How strong is Biometric Scan in the fight against Financial Frauds?
With the recent rise of smishing, vishing and many kinds of frauds, many victims have fallen prey to scams resulting in many losing large sums of money from their bank accounts.
With cybercrimes becoming more prevalent, the Bank of Thailand announced adjusting the systems to require face scans for high-value transactions, including digital money transfers of more than 50,000 baht, transfers of more than 200,000 baht per day; and change credit transfer amounts of more than 50,000 baht per transaction. The requirement is set at 50,000 baht as it represents approximately 1% of daily mobile banking transactions.
Given bad actors are targeting amounts of 50,000 baht and above, this new measure aims to strengthen cybersecurity in Thailand, focusing not only on preventing customers from being victims of financial frauds but also potential cyber-risks.
Nowadays financial theft is increasing and become a big issue. According to the central bank, fraudsters have developed many kinds of hubs, fake loan applications, deceptive text messages, and manoeuvres to lure consumers into installing malware-embedded applications on their phones.
Therefore, biometric technology in digital money transactions is aimed at preventing financial fraud. The most advanced facial authentication systems today project infrared dots on human faces to verify the depth detail of a person's face. This means that common techniques like using a picture or a mask are no longer effective in bypassing them.
The chance of a random person gaining access to your phone or data by fooling such advanced biometric security is typically less than one in a million, of which this level of safety is similar to a 6 digital passcode. Biometric scans will provide an additional layer of security-enhancing systems to protect consumers from financial fraud.
"Using biometric scanning as a fraud-prevention method is an advanced security approach recommended in the fight to protect customers' monetary funds," Tatchapol Poshyanond, Country Director of Thailand and Indochina, Palo Alto Networks commented.
"That being said, this advanced security approach needs to be coupled with fostering a Zero Trust mindset. Banks need to educate their customers to keep essential cyber hygiene measures in mind – from not clicking on suspicious links or attachments, and avoiding entering personal information on unsecured platforms," he said.
