National Australia Bank is exploring the use of biometric tracking of keystrokes and phone handling as part of a suite of initiatives to clamp down on fraudulent payments.
Speaking to delegates at an ABA conference, NAB CEO Andrew Irvine says the bank's ambition was to be the "best alarm on the street".
Pointing to a recent rare downtrend in losses from scams and fraud, Irvine says: “Most Australians have become more scam aware, and that’s a good thing."
At NAB, customers receive an alert if a payment appears out of character for them or raises scam concerns and are designed to encourage them to stop and check. The alerts target invoice, investment, romance, and goods and services scams in the NAB app and internet banking.
The bank says customers have abandoned more than $100 million in payments in the 15 months since the initiative was introduced to digital banking.
Describing scams and fraud as the scourge of our times, Irvine says: “Unfortunately, I do feel that criminals are going to continue to get more complex and capabilities like AI are going to increase the sophistication of attacks."
To combat this, Irvine says the bank is adding more friction into payment processes to protect customers.
“For example, in some cases if we’re seeing someone sending a payment somewhere they haven’t before, we’re asking, ‘are you sure?’ and are looking at biometrics like keystrokes and how they use their phone. And if it’s different than what we’ve seen you doing in the past, our intelligence will kick in.”