Identity Verification Trends and Predictions for 2022

By Ana Lucia Salazar, IDnow

1. The move towards Digital Identities on your mobile

Possibly one of the good things to come out of the COVID crisis, is people getting used to identifying themselves using official documentation online and on their mobile phone.  Although there has been some resistance to this in the UK, and elsewhere, and in extreme cases leading to civil unrest, the reality is that people have become used to having various forms of identity in an easy-to-share format, and having that in an app on your phone is the logical conclusion of that.   The French Pass Sanitaire (a proof of vaccination/COVID test/antibody levels) has largely been considered a success, and although the German digital drivers licence solution  was almost immediately withdrawn due to severe security and technical concerns, there are many that think that it proved the point in principle, if not in practice!

2.  Public and Private partnerships

Although there is some concern about private companies being used to provide ‘public’ services like identity, the reality is that wholly-owned public sector technology projects don’t have a good track record and are certainly no guarantee of success in a reasonable time frame.  There is a growing consensus that the wealth of knowledge, expertise and agile working practices in the private sector, combined with the regulatory and legal clout of the Government is the best route to a robust and trusted system for the future.  Europe has the draft eIDAS legislation which they are working on to provide a collaborative framework for Identity Verification amongst the member states, and it’s not clear whether the UK will cooperate with this system or develop their own.  But there’s no doubt that Public and Private is the way to go.

3. Consumer Power

As consumers increasingly come into contact with the labyrinth of stricter Identity Verification rules which vary from bank-to-bank and get frustrated with the ‘clunkiness’ of so many systems, so they are getting better at sharing their experiences on social media.  Many of the digital challenger banks have made their processes slicker and more customer-friendly, and the word is spreading:  fast and simple systems are not only becoming part of the business, they have made their way into the marketing departments.   People want to be kept safe by the systems, but they also want them to be easy.

4. Regulation

Never the most thrilling of subjects, but as fraud and scams have skyrocketed during the periods of lockdown in 2020/21, the regulators are fighting to control the existing range of financial services offerings, as well as the new digital assets including cryptocurrencies, digital exchanges, NFTs and so on.  Expect to see more regulation, as well as companies who are proud to be more regulated by the FCA, and regulations converging between countries. 

As an overall trend, we are seeing a great direction toward harmonization of standards and technologies in remote identification. An example of this is the release of new technical specifications in identity proofing and trust services. These specifications can also impact other KYC applications in AML and non-AML use cases across the globe.

5. Improving technologies leading to global verification systems

As we all start travelling again, we will see Identity Verification requirements on a more global basis.   We will be shopping globally online, physically moving around the world and using products and services from different geographies.  It has been a growing trend and we expect to see this increase even more in 2022.

6. Automated solutions on the rise

National regulators are paying much more attention to automated procedures, and in 2021, at least six European countries joined in to allow automated biometric identification for AML use cases. The UK was a pioneer in regulations here.