A new Mastercard interface—which the card giant dubs its Open Banking for Account Opening solution—provides integrated identity verification as new accountholders and customers are onboarded and begin transacting with businesses and financial services.
Mastercard announced the new API last week.
In doing so, the card network cited the following numbers:
- 78 percent of U.S. adults prefer to bank through a mobile app or website.
- Digital transaction volumes are expected to hit $15 trillion by 2027.
“Our digital identity and opening banking networks instill confidence on both sides of an interaction,” Chris Reid, the Executive Vice President of Identity Solutions at Mastercard, said in the company’s news release. “By securing our online ecosystem, we are delivering on our promise to bring more people and businesses into the digital economy.”
The API performs verification of account ownership and identity in real time. The prefilling of account and routing information reduces errors, Mastercard says, touting it as a solution for financial institutions and fintechs that provides easy onboarding with minimized fraud risk and friction.
Deeper Into Digital Identities
In a February Javelin Strategy & Research report, titled The Future of Digital Identities Is Now, Senior Analyst Suzanne Sando detailed consumers’ growing comfortability with the technology, particularly as it pertains to government-issued IDs and mobile driver’s licenses.
But, Sando wrote, the potential for digital IDs is much greater. Being able to securely demonstrate who they are, consumers can make use of these credentials in a range of use cases, including the receipt of government benefits, the opening of financial accounts, and enacting legal documents, among others.
The report also cautioned that FIs and identity-proofing vendors must take the initiative in alleviating consumers’ privacy concerns as they step toward new technology.
Back to Mastercard
Mastercard leans on subsidiaries Ekata and Finicity to power its new solution.
Finicity provides the open-banking muscle for the API. Ekata offers an identity attributes database for insights on identity verification.
The result, Mastercard says, is a solution that lets banks and fintechs proceed confidently, knowing who their customers are and that they own the accounts to which they link.
“Digital account opening is central to onboarding new customers and growing a business,” Jess Turner, Mastercard’s Executive Vice President for Global Open Banking and API, said in the release.