It’s 8:00 am and you are rushing out the door, late for work. On your way out the door, you receive a message from your bank claiming that they detected fraud on your account. Panicked, you click the link redirecting you to a website that you do not recognize. Several days later, you receive a call from your bank asking you to confirm transactions on your account. Unfortunately, all the transactions were not authorized by you. Luckily, the bank will be able to refund the lost funds, but you wonder if this could have been avoided if you had not clicked the link from the unknown number.
If you have been a victim of scam messages, you are not alone. More than four out of five consumers around the world have received a fraudulent message, and more than half of those in the Asia-Pacific region report having been scammed through SMS at some point in their lives. A February 2021 Insider survey conducted found that 46% of Americans reported receiving spam phone calls on their mobile phone every day with another 24% receiving them multiple times per week. Additionally, the survey found that spam calls impact everyone evenly irrespective of gender, age, and socio-economic status.
Fortunately, the technology to prevent unauthorized users gaining access to customers’ accounts is now readily available. Even if a customer has been duped into giving away their username and password, behavioral biometrics technology means banks can still block the scammer’s access to the consumer’s account. Behavioral biometrics are predicted to drive fraud prevention and detection for financial services, consumer applications and government applications. The behavioral biometrics market is expected to surge to $9 Billion by 2031 on a 20 percent compound annual growth rate, according to an insight by Fact.MR.
Defining behavioral biometrics:
Behavioral biometric technology evaluates a user’s interaction with a device like mouse activity, keystroke movement, and device movement. Analytical techniques are used to differentiate between a legitimate user and a scammer based on these unique patterns. Keystroke dynamics use the unique keying cadence of the user as a behavioral biometric. A facial image can be captured while the user is typing a username or PIN. This adds facial recognition to the analysis without increasing time to the capture. Together, they add barriers to spoofing and fraud only possible with multiple modalities. These multimodal authentication methods not only improve the biometric performance but also make it more difficult for fraudsters to spoof biometric scans. They also avoid negatively impacting the user experience by operating simultaneously.
Use cases for behavioral biometrics
Behavioral biometrics is currently used in payments, internet banking, e-commerce, and high-security authentication markets. However, behavioral biometrics can be applied to several different use cases that applies to a variety of sectors:
Stolen credentials:
behavioral biometrics can help validate the granted access to ensure system security
Password/account sharing:
behavioral biometrics can differentiate between users and determine when an authentication block is required.
User substitution:
Behavioral biometrics determine whether a user is who they claim to be. This can be useful in frequent cases of substitution of one person for another or company outsourcing.
Identity fraud:
Behavioral biometrics can help in the event of theft of user credentials, organizations that work with the end-user need to suppress attempts to access data or services by criminal.
User carelessness:
In the event the workstation or employee computer laptop is compromised, behavioral biometrics will take the necessary action if the unauthorized user is detected.
Benefits of incorporating behavioral biometrics
Technological advancements have increased the frequency of scam messages, spoofing and identity fraud. These threats cost companies and individuals millions in dollars every year. Behavioral biometrics aims to increase security and lessen the financial costs associated to fraud. Along with these overarching benefits, the technology is:
- Flexible: the set of behavioral data that can be analyzed is almost limitless and can be customized to meet the needs of the organization
- Convenient: behavioral biometrics does its job without causing disruption to the user
- Efficiency: behavioral biometrics can be used in real-time for both authentication and threat recognition
The need for stronger authentication is here
Scam messages are on the rise and can be extremely costly for both consumers and enterprises. Even though it is important to be aware of these messages and ignore them, human error happens. The need for stronger authentication methods is here and now. Incorporating behavioral biometrics—or other biometric modalities—protects both consumer and enterprise, giving enhanced security and peace of mind. As the adoption of technology increases, it is imperative that businesses and individuals streamline solutions that simplifies navigating digital identification.
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