It is a solution for strong customer authentication (SCA) and dynamic linking developed to bring safety and innovation to the payments market and its end-users.

After the EBA published on 21 June 2019 its opinion on the SCA elements under PSD2, addressing the concerns about the industry readiness to implement SCA into practice, it became obvious that many financial institutions were not prepared to meet the requirements. To assist institutions with it, Salt Edge introduces its latest contribution to open source with the code of Salt Edge Authenticator, created to make online commerce safer and increase customer protection in the new world of open banking. Salt Edge Authenticator securely handles all the actions where SCA should be applied: remote payment transactions, accessing payment accounts, and other types of authorization. Any member of the open source community is welcome and encouraged to ask questions and make contributions to the code: iOS App and Android App, and an example of server implementation.

The security of a solution can only be guaranteed when it is easily accessible for audit and formal verification. Open banking and open source have the word “open” in common, meaning both are part of a shared reality with transparency as the main value. And this is exactly what Salt Edge contributes to - greater financial transparency and security for end-users, and innovation in the payments industry.

In the era of open banking, data exchange involves so many participants that it inevitably increases the security breach risk. This is why Salt Edge chose the safest approach: no confidential data is processed by Salt Edge during customer journey, as end-users are connected straight to the bank. This way, users of the Authenticator app can be sure that their personal data is handled by their financial institution only.

Salt Edge Authenticator does not replace the bank’s existing authentication solutions, it actually adds one more security layer as mandated by PSD2. Salt Edge has developed the technology taking into consideration the already available in banks authentication solutions so its implementation requires minimal adjustments on the bank’s side to meet the SCA and dynamic linking requirements. An example of server implementation is presented to show Authenticator’s integration with the bank’s infrastructure. In addition to the open source project, Salt Edge also provides support & consulting services. These services include full maintenance and proactive monitoring.

“Since SCA plays such a crucial role in the user journey for open banking, Salt Edge believes that in order to push the open banking movement forward, it’s paramount to have a good, secure and easily accessible solution - Salt Edge Authenticator. This solution can be quickly customized for different regulatory standards in different countries, for different banking systems. As the official requirements change, we can adapt the Authenticator user flow in real-time to keep it frictionless and user-friendly,” said Dmitrii Barbasura, CEO at Salt Edge. “We are especially proud to make this project open-sourced since it is developed to protect customers. After all, each of us is a customer and needs to pay online more and more often - it’s nice to know we did a very important job of making this process safer.”