Yoti CEO Robin Tombs talks trust, publicity and chart success with BU Podcast

For the eight weeks since UK regulator Ofcom started enforcing the country’s new Online Safety Act and its corresponding age assurance rules, Yoti has been on a heck of a ride. The UK-based age assurance provider’s app was conspicuous near the top of the downloads charts around the July 25 compliance deadline, as users began seeking ways to prove their age online; by July 15, the company had already seen its app downloaded more than six million times. Eventually, for a day, Yoti’s app went to number one on the Apple App Store chart.

In the latest episode of the Biometric Update Podcast, Yoti CEO Robin Tombs says the company was pleasantly surprised – or, “completely flabbergasted” – at the spike in downloads. But he also believes that the public is coming around to the logic of reusable digital ID.

Tombs acknowledges that there are some who remain in strong opposition to age verification laws and age assurance technology. But he believes opponents fixate on the small percentages of error in technologies like age estimation, rather than the generally very high percentages of accuracy.

Even if rollout wasn’t perfect on the government and regulatory side, time will prove the law’s mettle. The technology is still new to many, but it won’t be for long, and in the meantime Yoti has been providing age assurance services to big clients like Meta and TikTok for years. “Lots and lots of Brits have already used it,” Tombs says. He notes, furthermore, that most people put their faces on social media willingly.

Yet, people object to “the idea that we might once encrypt that face, bring it back to the server, de-encrypt it, hold it in memory, check liveness, check age, destroy the face, and give the result to Meta.”

Part of the answer to trust, says Tombs, is smart regulation. To a large degree, Yoti’s business depends on following the rules in order to earn public trust. “We would be out of business if we said that we were destroying all those checks we’ve done – and we were telling the regulators we were destroying them all – and then they found out that we weren’t, our credibility would be toast in the market.”

“Our number one principle is, ‘act in the interest of our users’,” Tombs says. It’s not as though people have not suggested to him that he could make use of all that data. But ultimately, trust is Yoti’s core product.

On top of the success in the UK and Europe, Yoti also fared very well in the final report issued by the Age Assurance Technology Trial, which rated Yoti’s tech at Technology Readiness Level 9. Tombs says “Yoti has waited a long time to see independent, high profile, well funded technology trials of our facial age estimation (FAE). We’re delighted to read the results for Yoti just published in the Australia Age Assurance Technology Trial (AATT) Report.”

To hear Robin Tombs discuss the results, and learn more about what has gone into Yoti’s whirlwind few weeks, check out the full episode.

Listen now: Spotify, Apple, YouTube, Podbean

Runtime: 00:27:55

Article Topics

Age Assurance Technology Trial  |  age verification  |  Biometric Update Podcast  |  biometrics  |  facial age estimation (FAE)  |  Online Safety Act  |  Yoti