It says something about today’s market that companies are having to collaborate to solve the security issues raised by mobile wallets. According to the MIDAS Alliance, most current mobile wallets won’t meet the security standards for online payments proposed within the new European guidelines.
As a result, companies working within the security industry have got together to create their own mobile wallet solution. The Mobile Identity Authentication Standard, or MIDAS Alliance, is a global membership organisation that represents key stakeholders in the information security community. It promotes information security and authentication innovation through industry-wide collaboration.
New security standards go way beyond anything on the market currently, and there needs to be understanding of the strictures that the industry will need to adhere to. The MIDAS Alliance will help develop payments standards to provide solutions for simple processes to prevent online fraud.
Three of its earliest founders include Experian, Facebanx and FICO. One of the organisation’s founding members is Brian Kinch, a senior director of FICO, a global leader in anti-fraud software. “I believe this kind of information sharing is critical,” Kinch says, “to prevent security breaches, we need to bridge the gap between what the regulators are seeking and what the financial services industry is doing.”
Fellow alliance member Jonathan Williams, a director of Experian, agreed. “It is very important to create innovative solutions that improve consumers’ protection from fraud and are cost-effective enough to be able to be rolled out across the industry,” says Williams.
As one of the key security challenges of mobile wallets is account log in, Facebanx, a global leader in biometrics, was invited to become a founder member to explain the complex issues around biometric log in. Matthew Silverstone, Facebanx’ CEO says, “providing a solution for mobile wallets that lets the customer choose from one or more of the following biometrics — face, voice, eye and fingerprint — is an idea that is going to be discussed within MIDAS. Providing the customer with a multi-factor biometric authentication seems like a sensible solution.”
The first public meeting of the MIDAS Alliance will be held at FICO’s London office in Hays Lane on July 10, 2015. Personal membership is free. For more information go to: http://www.midasalliance.org/membership.html
