Cash-less: CBN considers biometric system for ATM, PoS

The Central Bank of Nigeria is considering a biometric
authentication system for transactions that will be
carried out on Point of Sale Terminals and Automated
Teller Machines.
The move is part of measures aimed at strengthening
the payment system under the bank's cash-less policy
initiative.
The Governor of the CBN, Mr. Lamido Sanusi, revealed
this on Tuesday in Abuja during the sensitisation of
stakeholders on the cash-less Nigeria programme.
Sanusi said the biometric system became imperative in
order to enable the bank effectively address safety of
customers' funds as well as avoid losses that might
arise owing to compromise of Personal Identification
Numbers.
He said if approved, the biometric authentication for
PoS and ATMs would be implemented in 2015.
The governor said the central bank had taken steps to
gain the confidence of ATM users by strengthening the
payment system.
For instance, he said going by statistics, fraud
incidences through ATMs and PoS had reduced by 90
per cent.
Sanusi said, "The CBN has taken a giant step to gain
the confidence of ATM consumers following the
circular enforcing migration from Magstripe type of
debit card to chip and PIN type of debit card.
"Statistics show that this effort has reduced the fraud
incidences by 90 per cent. Many customers are now
embracing the use of electronic channels in their
transactions because of near impossible efforts of
would-be fraudsters in being able to clone debit cards
to perpetrate fraud as it was the case during the pre-
migration era."