Industry executives and experts share their predictions for 2022.  Read them in this 14th annual VMblog.com series exclusive.

The Evolution of the Identity Verification Industry

By Robert Prigge, CEO of Jumio

From cyberattacks against critical infrastructure to COVID-19 vaccine fraud, 2021 was a busy year for cybercriminals and a challenging one for security professionals. Fraudsters not only leveraged more sophisticated techniques, but their strategies often resulted in success, as enterprises were unprepared to face the increase in cybercrime. With 2022 right around the corner, what trends can we expect to see in the upcoming year and how can enterprises prepare?

We have compiled several notable industry predictions that our security leaders see emerging in 2022:

Robert Prigge, CEO of Jumio

Organizations will consolidate identity verification vendors for the KYC process.

Historically, organizations with identity verification needs have used countless solutions to verify user identity, examine their identification and supporting documentation, authenticate them after every visit, ensure they aren't on any watchlists by conducting ongoing screenings, manage investigations, monitor their transactions and report suspicious activity. 

However, this approach is not only costly and complicated, it cannot adequately spot financial crime and properly verify user identity. Organizations are instead moving toward a single, comprehensive platform that consolidates these capabilities to effectively and efficiently confirm user identity and maintain compliance.

It is projected that by 2023, 75% of organizations will leverage a single vendor with strong identity verification capabilities and connections instead of using various other third-party solutions for identity proofing and affirmation, an increase from fewer than 15% in 2020.

Bala Kumar, CPO of Jumio

Organizations will put the consumer experience at the center of the identity verification process.

Historically, businesses have treated every consumer equally when onboarding. That is, assume every consumer is a threat and put lengthy onboarding processes in place to ensure low risk. Unfortunately, this causes friction more often than not and is one of the biggest causes of abandonment today. In fact, drop-off rates can be as high as 75% during onboarding if the customer experiences too much friction.

Rather than treating all users as potential threats, organizations will put the consumer experience at the center of the verification process. This will enable a more seamless consumer experience and smoother business operations. In 2022 and beyond, organizations will invest heavily to reduce abandonment rates and retain good consumers through the onboarding journey.

Labhesh Patel, CTO of Jumio

The future of AI technology and its credibility will rely on organizations mitigating AI bias through technology diversity initiatives.

As AI is adopted for an increasing number of business functions and data analysis, AI bias has become increasingly concerning for experts. Bias can impact AI algorithms in numerous ways to skew results and provide information that's not fair or objective by proxy. This is damaging to the credibility of AI technology and has the potential to stifle its growth and the consumer trust needed to advance it forward. The future of AI technology and its credibility will rely on organizations mitigating AI bias through technology diversity initiatives.

For example, a dataset that used to be considered the benchmark for testing facial recognition software had data that was 70% male and 80% white - not representative of the holistic population. Even if sensitive variables such as gender, ethnicity and sexual identity are excluded, AI systems learn to make decisions based on training data, which may contain skewed human decisions or represent historical or social inequities.

While diversity and inclusion are discussed from a hiring and corporate perspective, it must also be a critical component of product development. To get ahead of this issue, CTOs of organizations using facial recognition technology should be asking their technology providers how their algorithms are trained. This will put pressure on identity vendors to ensure their solutions' AI algorithms are built to represent the broader population.

Whether it's because organizations need to consolidate vendors, prevent fraud, improve the user experience or mitigate biases in their AI algorithms, the identity verification industry as a whole is evolving and will continue to do so in the coming year. With strong identity verification solutions, enterprises can confidently assure they are ready to face these challenges head on.

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ABOUT THE AUTHOR

Robert Prigge is responsible for all aspects of Jumio's business and strategy. Specializing in security and enterprise business, he held C-level or senior management positions at Infrascale, Secure Computing, McAfee, Quest Software, Sterling Commerce and IBM.