After several months of testing, USAA has formally launched a version of its mobile app that gives members the opportunity to gain secure access through facial recognition or voice-based verification. Long regarded as an innovator in mobile-first, multichannel, digital commerce, the company notes that this innovation makes it the first U.S. financial institution to protect member security by taking this dual biometric approach.

The app enables users to pay bills, make deposits and transfer funds. Members with iPhone 6’s or the soon-to-be available Apple Watch will also be able to use the pay-by-touch feature of Apple Pay once they add their USAA credit or debit cards to that Near Field Communications-based (NFC-based) service.

According to a report by Patrick Danner in Hearst Newspapers’ San Antonio Express-News Daon, a specialist in mobile authentication, identity management and biometrics, provides the dual biometric technology through its Trusted Identity Services business unit. Stephen Mayhew in Biometric Update notes that the service has been piloted for months in After months of piloting in  California, Texas and Florida, as well as in Georgia, North Carolina, New York, Washington, Colorado, Maryland, Arizona, Pennsylvania, South Carolina, New Jersey, Ohio, Tennessee and Illinois.

Danner notes that, based on the trials, USAA observed that “customers overwhelmingly prefer facial recognition over voice,” attributing the preference to the fact that voice is “susceptible to background noise,” which can make logging in take longer. USAA’s approach defeats efforts to spoof photos with pictures by requiring member so blink three times in order to authenticate.

During the panel discussion entitled “Achieving the Dream: Simple, Secure Communications Across Multiple Channels” at VBC London 2014, USAA’s Executive Director of Emerging Capabilities Darrius Jones explained how his company is simplifying access to a wide range of services over their channel of choice and device of choice. Biometric log-on is a small, but vital part of making personalized, secure services easy for its 10+ million members. Given its 92+ year history of serving members of the Armed Forces and their families, the need to keep things secure and simple is obvious.

Categories: Intelligent Authentication, Articles

Tags: Voice biometrics, omnichannel, digital commerce, facial recognition, USAA