Australian banks tackle rampant ID fraud with biometrics, liveness

Identity fraud affects more than a quarter of a million Australians each year, according to recent figures from the Australian Bureau of Statistics, and 1 in 10 experience card fraud. The worrying trend has inspired banks like the National Australia Bank (NAB) to unveil facial matching tech for identity verification. Now AMP Bank GO has made a similar move, saying its biometric liveness checks, provided by GBG, are preventing fraud as the country’s financial industry rises to the challenge.

AMP Bank GO announced that it has blocked more than 1000 mule and fraudulent account attempts since launching in February. It revealed that one fraudster tried to open an account as the country’s prime minister, using a fake name and fake ID (Anthony Albanese is currently Australia’s elected leader).

“We’ve seen it all, from fake to mis-matched IDs – the lengths fraudsters go to is nothing short of extraordinary,” said John Arnott, director of AMP Bank GO. “Taking a moment to scan your license or passport and record a quick selfie video might feel like a hassle, but it’s a small step for big peace of mind.”

AMP Bank partners with GBG to verify identity, with KYC mandated under Australia’s Anti-Money Laundering and Counter-Terrorism Financing Act 2006. This summer, Experian and GBG announced an expansion to their partnership as they deepen commitment to combating identity fraud and financial crime for consumers across Australia and New Zealand.

The bank’s use of face biometrics and liveness detection for customer onboarding coincided with its announcement of numberless Mastercards. Mastercard is replacing the 16-digit number with tokenization and device biometrics to combat identity theft and fraud.

In addition to the quick selfie video and numberless cards, other banks in Australia have turned to biometrics as a tool.

Banks wrestle with biometric identity fraud protection

Like AMP Bank, NAB customers provide a selfie when signing up to open a product or account.

The selfie system matches face biometrics to a scanned identity document like a driver’s license or passport. The system is not mandatory with other options available for those who can’t or won’t use the digital process.

It’s part of a broader effort in Australia to crack down on fraud and scams, which for NAB also includes eliminating links from text messages, introducing payment alerts to digital banking, and blocking transactions to some cryptocurrency platforms where it says a higher prevalence of scams have been detected. “Stopping scams takes a whole-of-ecosystem response,” said NAB Executive Group Investigations’ Chris Sheehan.

The Commonwealth Bank of Australia (CBA) reportedly uses facial recognition logins to its banking app to decide whether customers who dispute transactions are legitimate. However, using native device biometrics — such as an iPhone’s Face ID — for logins is not the most appropriate technology for the use case.

Ted Dunstone, CEO of Biometix and BixeLab, explained the limitations of using device authentication as evidence of who the user is. “Biometric logins are device-based, not identity-bound,” Dunstone said. “Face ID or similar technologies confirm someone with a registered face used the phone – but not necessarily who. Shared access, especially among family members, is common. And yet, biometric login logs are now being used as quasi-proof of transaction authorship.”

In 2023, Australian banks collaborated on the Scam Safe Accord — a “new offensive in the war on scams,” which aimed to introduce obligatory biometric checks for the opening of new accounts — as NAB has now done.

In November, five of Australia’s largest banks (NAB, ANZ, CBA, Suncorp Bank and Westpac) signed on for the launch of the BioCatch Trust Network, “the world’s first inter-bank, behavior-based, financial crime intelligence-sharing network.” The network enables instantaneous assessment of the trustworthiness of transactions and accounts, so transfers can be halted before any money changes hands.

Article Topics

Australia  |  banking  |  biometric liveness detection  |  biometrics  |  face biometrics  |  financial services  |  GBG  |  selfie biometrics