Signicat receives funding for IDaaS development from EU’s Horizon 2020

Identity assurance provider Signicat has secured €1.36 million ($1.7 million) in phase two funding from the EU’s Horizon 2020 programme to develop its identity-assurance-as-a-service (IDaaS) toolbox for use across Europe.

Signicat plans to offer its IDaaS to financial services and other businesses in Europe to identify the identity of new customers using eID, digital verification of paper ID, facial recognition, and other technologies. This will enable organizations to comply with KYC requirements through simple digital on-boarding.

Signicat received funding for phase one from Horizon 2020 in December 2016, which analyzed the need for digital on-boarding and its applicability. The analysis was carried out in collaboration with Innopay, and found that European eID schemes already provide 69 percent of the information necessary for digital on-boarding by financial insitutions, as well as identified gaps which could be addressed with IDaaS.

“A single digital ID market in Europe is vital so that financial service providers can easily offer their services across borders without the customer struggling to assert their identity. Cross-border digital ID creates greater choice and convenience for the customer, and opens up new markets for financial institutions” said Gunnar Nordseth, CEO, Signicat. “While eIDAS is a step in the right direction, it does not yet go far enough. Our vision is to integrate eIDs across Europe, making on-boarding customers simple for financial institutions and their customers, while still meeting KYC regulations.”

EU eIDAS regulations, which are intended to enable financial service organizations in Europe to meet KYC requirements with digital ID, has created an ecosystem which is inconsistent from country to country, according to the announcement, as individual member states define the tools used for each level of assurance.

Article Topics

biometrics  |  e-ID  |  EU  |  facial recognition  |  identity verification