LONDON (Alliance News) - Barclays PLC Friday said it will partner with Hitachi Europe Ltd on the launch of the Barclays Biometric Reader, which will allow customers to access their online bank accounts and authorise payments by scanning their finger.
The reader will use Hitachi's Finger Vein Authentication Technology and is set to be made available to Barclays Corporate Banking clients from 2015. The device is able to read and verify unique vein patterns in the finger and is designed to help combat identify fraud experienced by businesses in the UK.
Barclays said that, unlike finger prints, vein patterns are very difficult to replicate or spoof. It said the scanned finger must be attached to live a human body in order for the veins to be authenticated.
The bank said it would not hold the user's vein pattern and said there would be no public record of it.
It comes after the bank launched voice biometrics for its Barclays Wealth customers last year, allowing customers of its wealth management service to identify themselves via phone calls, eliminating the need to use passwords or security questions.
"We have shown the technology to a range of businesses and the interest and enthusiasm for the product is tremendous. The technology has also been tested by Hitachi for many years and it will be game-changing for UK businesses and consumers," said Ashok Vaswani, Chief Executive of Barclays Personal and Corporate Banking.
?Ultimately, I hope this will pave the way for other institutions to adopt equally robust technology in the fight against online crime," Vaswani added.
Barclays shares were trading slightly lower on Friday, down 0.1% at 230.6 pence.
By Sam Unsted; samunsted@alliancenews.com; @SamUAtAlliance
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Barclays (BARC)