COVID-19 creates a boom in biometric adoption

Goode Intelligence published a survey which captured the views and opinions of companies that have deployed or are thinking of deploying biometrics.

COVID-19 has accelerated the shift to digital, creating a boom in biometric adoption. Sixty-two percent of survey respondents said that their company has increased the prioritization of technology that supports remote onboarding and authentication due to the pandemic. To this end, 45 percent said that their use of biometrics has grown in response to COVID-19.

All survey respondents agreed that customer and user experience is “very important” or “important” to their organization, and 73 percent believe that biometrics are beneficial in this regard. When asked about the benefits of deploying biometrics, “convenience/usability” was tied with “security” for the top spot.

Of the 55 percent of respondents who said that their company is using biometrics today, 69 percent use the technology for authentication, 75 percent use it for identity verification (identity proofing), and 31 percent for fraud detection.

However, biometric deployment isn’t without challenges

Today, 40 percent of participants believe that biometric spoofing represents a high or very high threat. When asked about how high they feel the threat will be in two years, that percentage increased to 54 percent.

Subsequently, over 90 percent of respondents said that liveness detection is very important or important in combating biometric spoofing attacks.

“This survey offers important insight into how organizations are viewing biometrics in the COVID-19 era,” said Alan Goode, CEO & Chief Analyst at Goode Intelligence.

“Even before COVID-19, organizations have been increasingly turning to biometrics to balance convenience and security for identity verification, authentication, and fraud detection. We expect increasing levels of adoption of biometric technology to combat fraud and support frictionless user experience across all digital channels.”

“The survey results are evidence of companies adopting biometrics to provide users with the convenience and security they demand,” said Alexey Khitrov, president of ID R&D.

“It’s also clear that liveness detection is now a must-have technology for onboarding and authentication. We are intensely focused on defending against spoofing attacks without creating friction that lessens the advantages biometrics bring to the user experience.”