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Interviewee: Nick Ogden
Designation: CEO
Company: Voice Commerce
The SMART Sense: What sort of role does Voice Commerce play in the payment realm?
Nick: Voice Commerce delivers a wide range of payment services and identity and verification solutions to consumers and businesses. It has recently become a full member of The Payments Council and will be contributing towards The National Payments Plan. The National Payments Plan sets out a 10-year vision for UK payments together with the practical steps needed to put the vision into practice. As such Voice Commerce is uniquely positioned to support the Council in embracing the regulatory changes required to secure payments, with particular focus on e- and m-commerce. Voice Commerce is also the first non-bank member of Visa and MasterCard, giving the company a unique place within the market to balance expertise in Financial Services with solutions designed to verify identity, which delivers value to both consumers and businesses.
The SMART Sense: Using “Voice Signatures” to sign and authorize transactions? Tell us more about this.
Nick: Voice signatures allow consumers to use their own unique voice biometric to sign and authorise transactions. Using Voice Signatures guarantees transactional security when making a payment and protects users against personal data compromise. Voice Signatures are complex devices that combine the use of voice biometrics with transactional history, trends and patterns to create a highly secure, unique authorisation environment. The system can deliver two factor identity authentications virtually anywhere through a single call to the customer’s mobile phone. Authorisation failures, suspected imposters or potential fraudsters can be controlled and managed and transactions re-qualified using automated outbound IVR. This not only improves customer service but reduces the risk of fraud and identity theft.
The SMART Sense:
What inspired the development of such complex payment technologies?
Nick:
The exponential growth of both the internet and mobile devices has marked a new era for payments processing. As well as securing online payments against the threat of stolen cards being used to make fraudulent transactions, there is also now a major drive to safeguard payments made over mobile phones. Voice Commerce has pioneered the use of voice biometrics to address these challenges. In addition, current security methods that involve remembering various passwords are proving tedious and inconvenient for customers. By using automated voice authentication to fight fraud, financial organisations can also make identification and verification a more convenient and user-friendly experience for the customer.
The SMART Sense:
Discuss the security and threats associated with these solutions.
Nick: Although the introduction of Chip and PIN has reduced the occurrence of fraud in the face-to-face environment, most banks still see a significant identification and verification failure rate with their existing systems, particularly when the cardholder is not present. PINs and passwords are themselves easily compromised through intentional theft, user apathy and shoulder surfing – when fraudsters look over their target’s shoulder to steal their personal information. While it might feel like a game of cat and mouse, organisations need to keep abreast of technology advancements to ensure they stay one step ahead of the criminals.
Biometric technology is probably the single most powerful solution to combating fraud. We’ve seen significant investment in voice authentication in recent years, which uses voice biometric technology to prove the customer is who they say they are based on the unique characteristics of their voice. It is particularly advanced in Canada, Australia and the US and is becoming increasingly used by financial organisations in the UK.
Peoples’ voices are unique, just like their fingerprints. Voice authentication analyses voice samples to extract key characteristics of a person’s voice based on, for example, their vocal tract length and shape, nasal cavity size and shape, their pitch, speaking rate and prosody.
Voice authentication has developed in recent years and is now state-of-the-art, with a high accuracy rate – not only can it filter out background noise, it is capable of accepting changes in a person’s voice, as a result of a cold or aging, for example. As a Voice Signature is almost impossible to impersonate, it is infinitely more secure than a credit card PIN or password.
The SMART Sense:
In your opinion, how would you envision the payment environment in the next 5 years?
Nick: As we look ahead to the next five years, the mobile phone is going to have the biggest impact on the banking and payments landscape and will in fact revolutionise the way we pay. Today over 70% of the world’s population own a mobile phone and its use is certainly no longer restricted to just making calls. As well as doubling up as a person’s digital camera and music player, high speed internet is now standard, giving consumers the means to buy products, check bank accounts and make payments, all from a device that fits into the palm of their hands.
However, the key to mass adoption of m-payments will lie in introducing a solution which not only provides exceptional levels of security but at limited or no cost to consumers’ expectations of convenience.
Many banks are realising that a more precise and automated identification and verification process will allow them to begin to offer more and new automated services, which up to this point, have only been available through agents. Therefore, in five years’ time, we can expect to see the transition to automation of riskier transactions that are dependent on stronger security, such as change of address and reporting lost cards. These applications will lead to a better and more secure user experience and consequentially, happier customers.
Furthermore, financial organisations are starting to recognise that while customers are increasingly nervous about fraud, they will reject systems that are cumbersome or time consuming, which leave them and their bank ever more exposed. Not only is voice authentication user friendly, it offers a highly effective, affordable and convenient solution to a financial institution’s security issues, making it a candidate for widespread adoption. As a result, its prevalence could pre-empt the end of passwords and PINs, giving rise to a ubiquitous Voice Signature in five years’ time.
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