UK government guidelines for digital ID lauded by Yoti as eKYC guidelines for Arab region launched

The Good Practice Guide 45 (GPG45) update released by UK Government Digital Services at the end of 2019, and its approval of new ways of verifying identity have been welcomed by Yoti in a company blog post.

The revised GPG45 guidance can help companies identify individuals or the representative of a business, Yoti says, and notes that the use of synthetic and stolen identities in the UK is increasing each year. Yoti welcomes the inclusion of identity verification methods such as reading the chip of ID documents like passports, which often contain biometric information, and appreciates that the guidance is focussed on outcomes to remain technology-neutral.

GPG45 outlines an identity checking process consisting of acquiring evidence for a claimed identity, checking that evidence, checking the persistent existence of the identity over time, checking if the claimed identity has a high risk of fraud, and checking that the identity belongs to the person claiming it. The guidance sets out Low, Medium, and High assurance levels.

Yoti Director of Regulatory & Policy Julie Dawson writes in the post that Yoti focusses on the Low and Medium levels of assurance, but will also help organizations meet the High standard. Yoti provides biometrics to meet each assurance level, and the differences between the Low and Medium levels are outlined in the post.

The revised GPG45 will also accompany the UK’s new government-backed digital identity trust framework, which is expected to be issued soon.

The company has also seen a draft of the Good Practice Guide 44 (GPG44) standard, which addresses authentication credentials for online government services and are set for imminent release. Yoti lauds it as “an excellent guide for the authentication of users.”

Yoti is also among companies making proposals for UK immunity passports based on biometrics.

AMF launches eKYC guidelines

The Arab Monetary Fund (AMF) has published “Digital Identity and e-KYC Guidelines for the Arab Region,” which were composed by the Arab Regional Fintech Working Group to contribute to regional and global dialogue on the importance of digital identity, customer due diligence (CDD), and related concepts, and their impact on financial inclusion.

The announcement points out the potential for digital ID to help reach sustainable development goals, and estimates that 60 percent of world GDP will be digitalized by 2022. Balancing the need to incorporate digital technology with the need to mitigate potential threats is the challenge the guidelines are intended to address.

Most countries in the region continue to use in-person KYC processes, but Bahrain and the UAE are implementing eKYC processes, according to the announcement.

A range of actions are proposed in the guidelines, including the establishment of a Digital ID that collects minimal information and is unique, legal, interoperable. The guidelines also recommend the adoption of policies, rules and regulations to support the digital ID framework, the creation of a risk-based CDD regime balancing anti-money laundering (AML) and counter terrorism financing (CFT) objectives with financial inclusion, and the creation of benchmarks and standards for non-government identity systems, among other measures.

The publication was announced on Arab Financial Inclusion Day 2020, which was April 27.

Article Topics

biometric liveness detection  |  biometrics  |  digital identity  |  facial recognition  |  identity verification  |  KYC  |  Middle East  |  regulation  |  UK