Home > How to Improve Security in Mobile Banking with Face Recognition APIs?
Mousumi Paul
Dec 08, 2024
6 mins, 22 secs read
Face Recognition API
How to Improve Security in Mobile Banking with Face Recognition APIs?

Face Recognition APIs In Mobile Banking

Mobile banking is really impressive in today’s digital age, and there’re reasons you’re already familiar with.

From transferring money to applying for loans, and paying shopping bills to putting your hands on calculative investments - everything can be done with a single click.

However, as convenience amplifies, so does the risk of cyber threats. 

In a 2023 EY/IIF survey analyzing data from 88 banks across 30 countries, 72% of Chief Risk Officers globally identified cybersecurity as the most prominent threat that the banking sector will face in the years ahead.

This growing concern underscores the immediate urge to advance security support and among various solutions, face recognition became the most prioritized one.

With that said, I’ll delve into everything surrounding additional security measures of a facial recognition API that strengthen your consumers' interest in mobile banking services.

So, let’s have a walkthrough!

The Security Concerns Surrounding Face Recognition API Based Mobile Banking Apps

Mobile banking is a versatile service suite that connects and synchronizes various financial capabilities. Nowadays this service-providing app is using facial recognition API to necessitate security standards.

However, before I give you an idea about where security concerns lie, you must understand two approaches.

First, cyber threats can arise with any improperly built mobile applications that often use unsecured data in transit. Next, security exploitation is built up by the backend facial recognition APIs which are based on either a closed source or an open source-based model. More precisely, they can be differentiated by the concept -  freedom and transparency vs control and privacy.

So, while a financial business adopting an open source model, they accelerated the development process but at the same time heightened the risk of data security breaches.

Contrary to that, if they are willing to adopt a close source API, they grapple with the usage of users’ data protection.

This redefines why you need to choose closed source vs open source API - your choice of incorporating a facial recognition API in mobile banking service should balance between ethics of technical boundaries and respect for individuals’ rights.

The Security Features in Face Recognition API to Protect Mobile Banking

Before I take you to the process of how you can initiate robust security in facial recognition API-based mobile banking, let me tell you there’re built-in security measures to safeguard your consumers’ data.

Two-factor authentication

The facial recognition APIs allow you to enable two-factor authentication in a mobile banking application as an added protective layer.

This creates a shield against intruders who are involved in various types of cyber attacks, likely, spoofing, deepfake exploitation, and adversarial attacks - which all are related to bypassing authentication while using fake and duplicate facial images.

By having 2FA, facial recognition APIs ensure the second defensive forms that are beyond just a poor password and control the likelihood of unaware account accesses.

End-to-end encryption

The end-to-end encryption ensures facial recognition-based biometrics remains secure in its lifecycle while it’s used in a mobile banking app. Here’s how it works:

When a user’s face or liveness is detected in the app, his facial feature-based data is transmitted to the authentication endpoint over a secure channel, which cannot be decrypted by third parties.

Upon reaching the server, the data is decrypted using a private subject key for comparison with stored biometric templates, and once successfully verified, the system sends back the encrypted response securely.

Thus, this secure and encrypted communication between software eliminates the possibility of snooping which generally happens during facial data transmission.

Best Practices that You Can Follow to Secure Mobile Banking with Face Recognition API

As explained above, facial recognition APIs come with built-in security features, but that alone can’t control fraudulent activities. That’s why you can also contribute further to strengthen security by following these steps:

Implement strong authentication

Although 2FA works like double-layered protection to securely and accurately give gate passes to access the backend of facial recognition API, you must ensure they have a strong and unique password.

So, this way, in any circumstances, if one outsider from your financial organization acquires login credentials to your API, the 2FA code is received only by the authorized person. And, of course, this will fail intruders’ falsified attempts.

Regular security audits and testing

The dedicated team of your developers can do consistent security audits to catch potential flaws and weaknesses in the process. It’s important because you may not want to afford to catch vulnerabilities after data breaches.

Besides, ensuring your own mobile application is secure in every way is in your hand which you can do through independent penetration tests and code reviews. Ignoring this can lead your mobile banking application’s performance to be biased while adjusting updated versions.

Secure API endpoints and limit access

Ensure your close observation of the API doc of your integrated closed-source facial recognition API to know if its endpoints are secured with HTTP protocols. Additionally, you must check the security certification as well, which provides full protection against man-in-the-middle (MITM) attacks and data interception or data loss during its transmission.

Further, you can limit access to the backend of facial recognition API, so that you’re aware of who’s entering when and why. Along with this, implementing a role-based access control can provide you with more precision at its best.

Maintain data privacy compliance

Compliance with data privacy regulations is critical when handling facial biometric data. Protecting users' sensitive information from misuse and data breaches fosters customer confidence in your mobile banking platform and its credibility.

This is why ensure that your facial recognition API is aligned with the regulations, which include clear consent from users for data collection, storage, and usage.

When generally we’re very familiar with the regulations, likely, GDPR and CCPA, remember, you have to comply with national or international regulations, concerning your target consumers' locations.

Educate your employees 

Last but not least, educating your internal employees about the importance of facial recognition is necessary. This is because many times, we see data breaches due to internal negligence and poor management of sharing login information, which is mostly done through emails.

So, don’t ignore training your reps about how to handle API login credentials more mindfully, share details securely with only authorized members, and always refrain from tapping on an unvaried link.

Take Lystface Face Recognition API to Enhance Security & Protect Your Customers’ Interest

Today, all mobile banking apps have your consumers' personal information, likely, their ID, transaction history, credit and debit card details, and other financial information too. So, when you want to secure your consumers’ trust by authenticating themselves with facial recognition and mitigating potential fraud, you must acknowledge facial recognition API security features first. 

Because the security standard doesn’t only rely on how it is built but how you manage it. And, if you’re searching for a top-notch facial recognition API that can manage security concerns on your behalf, then Lystface API can be your go-to solution.

Lystface API not only always hosts on a server that comes under eagle-eyed surveillance but also practices the latest security updates. Besides, to get access to it, you must have a strong password to log in and an extra layer of protection will be provided by 2FA whose link will be sent to the same email that is subjected to your credentials.

So, why not check it on your own if this API can build that robust security in mobile banking services that your customers are craving? Let’s check Lystface pricing first and tap on the signup.

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