How Biometrics Improves Onboarding

One of the most important processes in any online business is a fast, smooth customer onboarding experience. For industries like online gaming and gambling that have age restrictions and other regulations, this can be a major pain point. In fact, according to research as much as 25% of gamblers have stopped in the process of opening a new account and moved to another provider because of a complicated onboarding process. 

Using biometric technology can have a great impact where stringent know your customer (KYC) regulations have made the onboarding process longer and more difficult. For example, the Gambling Commission in the UK started enforcing new rules in May 2019 that could affect how smooth the onboarding process could be for customers. Applying biometric technology to gambling applications can help streamline the process and make it a good experience for customers.

Biometric technology can help confirm identity quickly and seamlessly by using facial recognition to match against an ID and verify proof of life. This reduces fraud by stopping anyone who has stolen another person’s ID from gaining access to the business’s platform—whether that’s a child trying to use their parent’s credentials or someone who has stolen information off the internet or in person.

Here’s how biometric technology works: during onboarding, a new customer uploads their ID document that is verified in real time. Then they take a selfie, which is checked against the image on the ID they uploaded. The technology can detect differences such as facial hair, makeup, age difference, hairstyle, and skin imperfections between the selfie and the ID document. 

After this, a liveness check is performed, which confirms details such as eye movement to make sure that the person in front of the camera is real and not a static image. This helps eliminate spoofing—trying to use videos or images of the person on the ID documents that were submitted to “prove” they’re the real person. The whole process should only take minutes and is easy for both the customer and business to use, making biometrics an appealing addition to onboarding processes that have to comply with strict compliance regulations.

If you’re interested in adding biometrics to your onboarding processes, Melissa ID is an easy-to-use ID verification solution that uses biometrics to make sure that the customers who are onboarding with you are who they say they are. User verification is done in a simple 1-2-3 process in an app that the customer can download and use wherever they are, on any device they choose.

For more information about Melissa's Identity Verification solutions, schedule a demo or connect with a member of our team by calling 1-800-MELISSA. Don't forget to subscribe to our blog for everything related to data quality!