We are seeing different approaches and focuses on providing KYC, emerging:

• Swift provides “A secure, global platform for sharing KYC data” because they say “Customer due diligence and KYC is essential in order to protect the global financial system from money laundering and financing of illegal and criminal activities.” (Ths services is for banks and companies on Swift.)
• Encompass whose mission is “To enable regulated firms to comprehensively detect and prevent financial crime and reduce regulatory risk by ensuring that full information on the parties involved is available efficiently and in a timely manner.”

BUT it is also becoming clear that KYC also needs to cover both personal and business data, and not be limited to companies and banks on a particular network. Data is needed across all sectors, and not only this, KYC needs to also to cover and comply with both GDPR as well as AML requirements.

Overall, the driving force behind KYC solutions is to ensure that individuals and companies know who they are connecting to which enables them to control/prevent all types of fraud/financial crime from AML, cybersecurity fraud, etc. This is not easy because it involves so many sorts of different businesses and individuals.

NewBanking IDENTITY platform

NewBanking is a Danish RegTech company, founded in 2015, that regards the KYC problem as one of enabling people and companies to safely exchange identity information in a secure, regulatory compliant and transparent way. It owns, develops and operates its platform for personal and business data management. This service is called The NewBanking IDENTITY platform which aims to securely store and share information to prevent money laundering and stay up-to-date with privacy regulations.

NewBanking believes that KYC is about secure information exchange. They do this by having different approaches to the personal and business markets.

Personal market

In the personal market, the focus is on giving individuals protection and control of their information by providing them with a free account for their data which has no tracking and no ads and provides:

• Secure storage which fully encrypts the data in a personal data vault
• Encryption of their data when data is being shared and tracks of when data has been shared
• Full control of who has been given access to the data and the ability to “request to be forgotten” at any time.

This data can be used in many different ways, e.g.

• applying for:
  • a bank loan which requires ID documents, social security numbers, old bank statements, etc.
  • a job enabling applicants to send in their CV
• contacting lawyers and providing legal contracts, etc. safely and securely.

Users here include:

• DFDS Group, the ferry company, which used the NewBanking IDENTITY platform to collect personal information from their 4.500 employees from 21 different nationalities and securely integrate the IDENTITY database with their website.
• Danske Bank who used NewBanking IDENTITY for creating and allocation company shares to all employees. 

Business market

In the business market NewBanking focus on providing companies with a convenient and transparent onboarding service for new customers to reduce costs and at the same time comply with their GDPR requirements and KYC regulations. Key features include:

• Onboarding widget which is fully integrated with the business website:
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• AML features including ID verification, global screening for PEP, sanctions-busting activity and adverse media screenings
• Collecting company information from a wide range of sources, etc.
• Global Passport/ID verification.

All backed up by a comprehensive range of features to help companies manage their KYC data securely and comply with local and international regulations.

Current users include:

• Scale Capital who “Use NewBanking IDENTITY for onboarding investors from around the world. The solution lends us a mechanism and process, as well as storage of information, but above all, it provides us with a peace of mind that we are protecting our investors' data."
• Polaris Private Equity who needed “one system to help us handle the increasing regulatory framework when onboarding new investors and keeping track of the existing. Our focus is to be compliant at all times with both AML and GDPR.”
• Bech Bruun who found that “With the NewBanking IDENTITY system clients can now share relevant data in minutes, with customer satisfaction and feedback."

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CTMfile take: The NewBanking IDENTITY service shows that KYC is really about secure information exchange of both business AND personal data. And that KYC is primarily driven by AML and GDPR regulations and requirements. Interesting and could be very important.