SWIFT today announces the introduction of Payment Controls, an intelligent new in-network solution to combat fraudulent payments, and to help strengthen its customers’ existing security.

The commercial availability of the service marks an important milestone in SWIFT’s Customer Security Programme (CSP) – a community initiative launched in 2016 that has increased security and trust across the global financial community.  

Payment Controls helps payment operations teams mitigate fraud risk in real-time through its unique alerting and reporting capabilities. The service may be set to flag, hold, release or reject high-risk or uncharacteristic payments in real-time, according to business needs. Initially targeted at smaller financial institutions, the utility service is hosted in the SWIFT cloud to allow users immediate access, with no hardware or software installation or maintenance.

Payment Controls is an important safeguard for firms as the frequency and speed of payments increases. The service bolsters SWIFT’s global payments innovation (gpi) – the new standard in global payments, which has dramatically improved cross-border payments since it was launched last year. 

As part of gpi, and to further strengthen customer defences, SWIFT will introduce a new ‘stop and recall’ capability that will enable banks to immediately stop and recall a payment anywhere in the chain. The new feature will provide another barrier against fraud – mitigating business disruption and financial losses in the face of rising threats. 

Luc Meurant, Chief Marketing Officer at SWIFT, said: “The growing threat of cyberattacks has never been more pressing, and banks need to be able to verify the integrity of payments in real time. Payment Controls demonstrates our commitment to playing our part in protecting the security of the wider financial services industry. I am confident that the new service will be an important weapon in the fight against fraud.”

Mark McNulty, Global Clearing and FI payments Head, at Citi, said: “Putting the right security tools in place is vital for any bank in mitigating payment fraud risk. The launch of SWIFT’s Payment Controls service is a very welcome step towards reinforcing and safeguarding the security of our ecosystem. For banks, it screens transactions in-flight and flags, holds or rejects transactions based on risk policies – ultimately protecting their operations, fighting cyber-crime and making the community safer for everyone.” 

Patricio Melo, Executive Vice President of Technology and Operations at Banco Davivienda, said: For Davivienda it is a privilege to work with SWIFT, especially at this pivotal moment in the financial industry, in which banks should be working towards strengthening their payment processing systems and reducing the threat of fraud. Through the service provided by SWIFT’s Payment Controls, we are confident that our system will not only be better protected from fraud risk, but allow us to then deliver a trusted service to our clients.” 

Moneynetint, UK based electronic e-money institution which provides cross-border money transfers and currency exchange for corporate clients around the world, announced that it had completed the integration phase with Ripple, which offers blockchain solutions for payments.

Following the completion of the development, integration processes and full deployment of Moneynetint, as part of RippleNet, Moneynetint has already begun to receive payment instructions from two other network partners and process these payments in a secure and decentralised manner.

Yishay Trif, CEO of Moneynetint: "The cooperation signed with Ripple is part of the company's strategic move to advance into innovative areas of the payments industry and to become a groundbreaking institution in the field. The fact that RippleNet serves as a platform that sets uniform parameters for all its members facilitates the process of interfacing between international financial entities. For Moneynetint, the collaboration is a leap forward in the ability to provide advanced services to its customers, opening additional corridors and opportunities that have not been available or had no reliable nor cheap solution for them in the past and as a result, increasing Moneynetint' exposure to a wider customer base while minimizing the risks involved."

"Once we realised how professional the Ripple team was and supports the process, we decided to choose them. We expect that together we will be able to lead significant development and simplify processes in the area of cross-border money transfers. The processes of interfacing and approval between financial institutions, previously taking months or even years are now significantly reduced to a matter of days to a few weeks", Trif added. 

As part of the collaboration, those international financial institutions already connected to the RippleNet payment platform and seeking to benefit from the Moneynetint infrastructure and capabilities will now be able to quickly and easily interface without the need for additional API execution.

"We welcome the collaboration with Moneynetint Their ability to now facilitate payouts in Israeli New Shekel - in addition to Euros - on behalf of other RippleNet members is another big step in expanding the overall network. By leveraging Ripple’s blockchain technology, Moneynetint will now be able to simplify and reduce the FX conversion rates for their customers, increase the speed of settlement and offer services to new markets that would otherwise have been too difficult or too costly to reach in the past", said Nadeem Ladki, Director of Account Management of Ripple.
 

SWIFT has today published a blueprint for common API standards following collaboration with European banking standards bodies, STET and Berlin Group NextGenPSD2 – who together represent many of the region’s banks and payment service providers. 

As pressure from regulators and customers shift banking towards more open access to financial services, SWIFT is playing a lead role in unlocking the potential of API technology by providing the neutral collaboration platform to develop the common data standards the industry needs.

SWIFT’s white paper,Towards a global platform for the Financial Services API economy, published today, concludes that a successful transition to an API-based financial ecosystem is only possible if financial standards bodies converge towards a shared business standardisation methodology.

Regulators around the world have identified the need for interoperability among financial institutions as they move towards a more open banking model. SWIFT, STET and Berlin Group NextGenPSD2 are at the centre of efforts to avoid fragmentation, isolation, and the needless complexities that will frustrate attempts to build the value-added services that customers want. 

SWIFT is working to minimise inefficiencies caused by differing regulatory specifications that could limit opportunities for common API frameworks across different regions and potentially require different solutions for every market. The cooperative has lent its long-standing expertise in standards, specifically ISO 20022 – the standard for electronic data interchange between financial institutions – to work alongside STET and Berlin Group NextGenPSD2 in Europe to define the building blocks for the new services that will spring from the new API economy. 

Stephen Lindsay, Head of Standards at SWIFT, said: “APIs are at the core of SWIFT’s strategy and a key part of how we deliver a faster, more transparent experience to our customers. Overall, the financial services industry has been slow to adopt APIs, but it’s catching up fast. With the wealth of experience we have working with standards at SWIFT, it is fitting that we’re at the forefront of API standardisation and efforts to avoid fragmentation of approach as the industry embraces API technology. In our role as neutral facilitator, we have made the most of our unique position to create and maintain the standards necessary for processing financial transactions efficiently and securely.”

SWIFT, STET and Berlin Group NextGenPSD2 have concluded a first phase where a business model for the PSD2 Account Information Services has been defined using common standards. This data model will be the foundation for any API definitions and will enable interoperability among PSD2 participants. This work follows a successful collaboration on the creation of a common API framework between SWIFT and Australia’s New Payments Platform (NPP). 

Onur Ozan, Head of Middle East, North Africa & Turkey, SWIFT, said: “While regulations such as PSD2 do not directly impact Middle Eastern banks, they are still exploring how open banking and APIs can help deliver a better service for their customers. SWIFT’s blueprint for common API standards will help local and regional banks do business with European customers, develop world class products and services and remain competitive in this increasingly digital world.” 

Hervé Robache, PSD2 API Coordinator at STET, said: “STET has been involved with PSD2 API topics since 2016. Our participation in different working groups at the European level has confirmed our assumption that there is strong demand for common standards. Having the building blocks that can accommodate all business needs and be reused by all API providers is critical to achieving this goal, which is why the development of this ISO20022 model is such an important and exciting development.”

Dr. Ortwin Scheja, Chief Editor at Berlin Group NextGenPSD2, said: “For Berlin Group NextGenPSD2, alignment and convergence on PSD2 API standards has always been a crucial objective which has consistently been communicated into the market since the start in 2016. The alignment with SWIFT and STET on the PSD2 relevant data models is a perfect example of a core component in the harmonisation that Berlin Group NextGenPSD2 advocates. We believe that open and harmonised PSD2 API standards are the necessary building blocks of an interoperable market.”

 Moven Enterprise, the smart-banking solutions division of Movencorp, Inc, today announced that it has expanded its footprint globally to help banks deepen their digital customer engagement and drive new revenue streams while significantly reducing attrition and acquisition costs.

After working successfully with TD Bank (TD) in Canada, Westpac in New Zealand, and others, Moven is now bringing its AI-driven digital banking platform to banks across LatAm, APAC, Africa, the Middle East and Europe. The global expansion is well-positioned as Moven Enterprise received investment from SBI Group to enhance Moven’s footprint in Asia earlier this year. This included the formation of a joint venture, SBI Moven Asia. The company’s innovative platform leverages a bank’s data and uses proprietary algorithms to create contextual, individualized smart-banking experiences for consumers; providing them the right advice at the right time with the right offer and helping them move towards a better financial lifestyle. 

Starting out as a direct-to-consumer banking app in 2011, Moven began licensing its technology to TD in 2016 as the app attracted increasing interest from the banking community to enhance customer engagement. The licensing extension led to the launch of the proprietary TD MySpend^®app, TD's leading mobile money management app that now has more than 1.5 million users. As a result of this success, Moven piloted a soft-launch of Moven Enterprise with several banks, including Westpac in New Zealand, quickly expanding its global footprint to customers worldwide.

Today, global banks have access to Moven Enterprise’s customizable technology options to drive their digital growth. In addition to significantly reducing a bank’s time to market, Moven offers a range of implementation options to help banks expand their market reach and generate new revenue streams. Moven Enterprise’s solution aligns a consumer’s needs to a bank’s revenue and relationship goals. Moven’s turnkey technology model offers a range of options for easy access including Moven’s smart banking solutions stack together with open APIs and SDK tools.

Marek Forysiak, Moven CEO, adds, “Moven has a proven model for success. Several of our 
client banks’ results tell the story - from significantly reduced attrition rates, positive customer engagement and increased savings behaviors and reduction in spending, Moven is well-positioned to roll-out our enterprise offering to banks around the world.”

Rizwan Khalfan, TD's Chief Digital and Payments Officer, explains, “Moven’s technology innovations have helped us offer our customers new ways to bank that foster a greater understanding of their finances and contribute to their overall well-being. We will continue to work with Moven as we develop inspiring new mobile experiences for our more than 12 million digital customers across North America."

Moven’s recent partnership with SBI Group, which included a $10 million-dollar investment from the financial services company, is helping drive this global growth with the establishment of SBI Moven Asia. For the first time, this new entity will offer customizable technology for banks to deliver personalized advice-driven mobile banking to optimize customers’ financial wellness. The investment from SBI and local support will bring greater opportunity for Moven Enterprise’s Asian partners. 

Brett King, Moven founder, states “SBI’s partnerships with more than 60 banks across Asia gives us the opportunity to deploy our solutions quickly and efficiently, offering our Asian customers tailored and localized support and attention.” 

Today, millions of Moven customers use the mobile banking app, debit card, and advice-driven savings tools which provide real-time, personalized spending insights that help motivate users to make smarter decisions, helping them ‘spend, save & live smarter’. To better service Moven’s partners and meet the demands of the global expansion, Moven Enterprise has expanded the sales team into the LatAm, APAC, Middle East and European regions. Additionally, Moven has strengthened its management team with experts in management, sales and marketing to support the company’s customers and global growth.

ING Bank has announced the release of its Zero-Knowledge Set Membership (ZKSM) solution. The solution marks the further development of the bank’s Zero-Knowledge Range Proof (ZKRP), that empowers clients by improving privacy in a Distributed Ledger Technology (DLT) environment.

ZKRP enables numeric data to be validated with a specific number range – for example, a mortgage applicant could prove that their salary sits within a certain range without revealing the exact figure. The breakthrough technology of ZKSM allows for alphanumeric data to be validated within a specified set. This opens up a whole new range of applications which can protect data privacy on the blockchain.

Furthering the ZKRP capability, ZKSM can prove dimensions such as geographic positioning making it faster and more cost-efficient. As an example, in a Know Your Customer (KYC) check, a user can be validated to be part of a group – an EU citizen – without disclosing the exact country that he/she lives in. If the data set formed includes all countries in the European Union and if the private information given is the country of residence of a user, the user can prove that he/she is an EU citizen. 

DLT presents a huge opportunity to increase efficiency and simplicity both for financial services and clients who have dealings with financial institutions. One of the major challenges in implementing new DLT is protecting private information on a public ledger, where changes must be verified by each participant in the network.

Annerie Vreugdenhil, Head of Wholesale Banking Innovation at ING, said: “ING’s overall goal with DLT and specifically blockchain is to create solutions that empower our clients to transform their business models. One of the key elements in this process for clients is how to deal with data and privacy. ZKSM is the next step in this journey.”

“At ING, we are fortunate to have some of the best minds in the industry working on our programme, and we are excited that our ground-breaking solution is now ready to be implemented and tested,” she added.

ZKSM is being launched as an open source. This enables external developers to access and further adapt the solution, encouraging the industry to pool its wider expertise to evolve the technology to meet industry demand. 

Broadridge Financial Solutions, Inc. (NYSE:BR), an S&P 500 company and global Fintech leader, today announced a next-generation solution to address key industry, business and operational challenges with global asset servicing. Designed and developed with a global tier-one bank and now cloud and SaaS-enabled and selected by leading global banks, the full end-to-end solution streamlines corporate actions, dividend and coupon processing across multiple asset classes, business lines and regions by automating the full asset servicing lifecycle, bringing scale, speed, accuracy and efficiency to firms globally.

Inefficient processes in asset servicing currently present significant challenges, specifically an increase in operational risk and a reduced ability to control costs. The Broadridge global asset servicing solution helps firms mitigate these drawbacks by standardizing and automating processes for announcements, notifications, elections, accruals, entitlements, and settlements globally. Broadridge’s global asset servicing solution has the ability to support and enhance front office activities through comprehensive data management and analytics, helping traders and portfolio managers mitigate against losses and pursue revenue generation, for example through arbitrage opportunities.

This solution is currently being deployed by leading global firms, including as a unified global platform replacing multiple silo systems across geographies and business units, spanning the Investment Bank, Wealth and Asset Management business lines. With one centralized platform, clients can view, manage and report across portfolios, events and global trading models, bringing visibility and transparency across the entire asset servicing lifecycle.      

“The number of corporate actions is increasing across global markets – each one navigating a complex network of intermediaries and custodians. With fragmented systems and regulatory pressures increasing processing challenges, financial institutions need a modern solution that simplifies their architecture, streamlines the operations and improves risk management,” said Tom Carey, President of Broadridge Global Technology and Operations. “Our industry-leading solution – designed by users for users – simplifies the technology of our capital markets clients and helps their back-office functions drive real business and operational value.”

ICS BANKS Auto Collection System is a robust collections software solution that is introduced to reduce and mitigate risk of managing past due or delinquent accounts. This automated system monitors the customer’s accounts which have unpaid arrears in order to track any amount that becomes available, and blocks it against these arrears, before being drawn or used by the customer.

SWIFT announces successful test results of its new instant cross-border payments proof of concept, involving banks in China, Singapore, Thailand and Australia.
The trial successfully demonstrated that by enabling gpi in real-time domestic systems, payments can be effected almost instantly, even when they involve domestic settlement and non-gpi banks.
Since going live in 2017, SWIFT gpi has removed many of the common frictions experienced in cross- border payments. 50% of gpi payments are now being credited to end beneficiary accounts within 30 minutes and many of those within seconds. The fastest payment made directly between gpi banks in these corridors was initiated from a gpi bank in Singapore and credited to a bank account at an Australian gpi bank within nine seconds. In effect, this is already a live real-time cross-border payment.
However, when there are multiple banks involved in the payment chain, and the final leg needs to be cleared within the recipient country, the domestic payments are sometimes delayed owing to the limited operating hours of the local clearing systems.
With the advent of real-time payments systems, which typically operate 24/7, there is an opportunity to remove these frictions and ensure that many of these payments can be credited in seconds rather than hours.
The debut of Australia’s domestic instant payment system, the New Payments Platform (NPP), enabled SWIFT and a group of banks from Australia, China, Singapore and Thailand*, to study the feasibility of enabling the gpi service in NPP and to review how this would enable these cross-border payments to be sped up.
What the trial sought to establish was whether, by integrating and enabling the service via gpi members into a domestic instant payment system, the gpi experience could be extended deeper into domestic markets, to end beneficiaries’ accounts, even outside normal business hours.
This trial has indeed confirmed that the SWIFT gpi “payments in seconds” experience can be extended seamlessly via domestic real-time payment systems to all NPP enabled bank accounts.
Key highlights from the trial:

• Twelve participating banks participated in this trial, with nine banks sending cross-border SWIFT gpi payments to Australia, and three banks in Australia processing the payments domestically via NPP.
• The trial covered three country corridors, namely China-Australia, Singapore-Australia and Thailand-Australia.
• Most real-world requirements were simulated in the test to ensure comprehensiveness, including: screening, payment validations, liquidity management, message transformation and real-time status updates to the SWIFT gpi tracker.
• The extension of operating hours was validated with incoming payments processed both during and outside business hours in Australia.
• The fastest SWIFT gpi payment in the trial was sent from China, reaching the end beneficiary account in Australia via NPP in 18 seconds.
• The fastest test payments from Singapore and Thailand were similarly credited to Australian end beneficiaries via NPP within 30 seconds.
• All the payments sent during the trial were processed end-to-end within 60 seconds.

Mr. Eddie Haddad, Managing Director of SWIFT, Asia Pacific, said: “These results demonstrate two important prerequisites necessary to realise an instant cross-border payment service. First, we are able to extend the window for processing cross-border payments outside traditional business hours. Second, by enabling cross-border SWIFT gpi payments via gpi members, through domestic real-time payment systems, we are able to achieve faster cross-border payments amongst a larger number of institutions. The linkage was achieved by participant banks like National Australia Bank processing incoming SWIFT gpi payments onward as NPP instant payments.”
Mr. Paul Franklin, General Manager, Payments, National Australia Bank Limited, said: "NAB is proud to have taken a lead role in the recent SWIFT instant processing proof of concept for cross- border payments into NPP. We have demonstrated the ability for customers to have access to funds within seconds and dramatic decreases in end-to-end processing times. It has given us an opportunity to show that our 24/7 clearing capability through NPP can be used to process international payments to other banks outside traditional RTGS business hours, which offers the potential for much later cut- off times, which is especially useful for payments originated in Asian time-zones. The success of this pilot has come from the combined effort of the participating banks, and a mutual desire to deliver a better payment experience for customers.”
This initial trial focussed on payments going into Australia through gpi banks into NPP, however findings from the trial are now being used to finalise a new SWIFT gpi instant cross-border payments service, designed to scale and integrate with other real-time payment systems across the world. SWIFT is in discussions, together with banks, with multiple domestic real-time payment operators and regulators to discuss how those payment corridors could also be enabled with gpi. The service will reuse existing SWIFT gpi infrastructure, adding incremental business rules to remove residual business frictions in the payments chain, thus avoiding the need for additional investment in new cross- border infrastructure.
Since its launch in January 2017, SWIFT gpi has been rapidly adopted by over 270 financial institutions, with more than USD100 billion in SWIFT gpi messages sent every day. Half of SWIFT gpi payments are credited to end beneficiaries in less than 30 minutes, many in seconds, and almost 100% of gpi payments are credited within 24 hours. Over 30% of all SWIFT customer payments are now sent on gpi. By the end of 2020, SWIFT will extend the benefits of its gpi service to all 10,000 banks on its global network

MYHSM announces the first dedicated payments hardware security module (HSM) hosted service using Thales payShield HSMs. MYHSM enables merchants, acquirers, Payment Service Providers (PSP), Payment Facilitators (PayFac), and issuers, to utilise security as a service to simplify operations as well as leverage cloud services while focusing on improving the consumer digital payment experience.

MYHSM is the first company to offer dedicated payShield HSMs as a hosted service, allowing organisations to achieve their ambitions and meet the growing demand for SaaS solutions for complex payment systems. For the first time it is possible to offer a fully certified and managed payShield HSM-as-a-service. This solution benefits banks, merchants and acquirers alike by removing capital infrastructure constraints and the need for highly skilled resource usually associated with payment platforms – enabling payment transaction processing and payment credential issuing with trusted key management for the dynamic payments industry.

The service will provide hosting and management functions for Thales payShield HSMs to enable both existing and new entrants to the payments world to comply with regulatory and applicable Payment Card Industry (PCI) standards. This will provide an ideal platform for those intending to take advantage of current and emerging standards such as mobile payments, 3DS 2.0, PCI’s new PIN on Mobile standard, which permits secure PIN entry into commercial off-the-shelf (COTS) devices such as smartphones and tablets, and secure remote commerce.

The benefits:

• No dedicated in-house infrastructure investment 
• No requirement for advanced and secure hosting environment
• No need to hire and train dedicated skilled staff
• No trusted key custodianship obligations
• Reduced certification costs. 

Justin Pike, Director, MYHSM and Founder, MYPINPAD says: “As new user experiences are created and existing experiences enhanced, consumer trust and expectations regarding the replication of physical world experiences in the digital world have also evolved. Mobile commerce is expected to dominate online sales by 2021 and the challenge for the payments industry is to find the right balance between providing a seamless user experience and meeting vital security requirements. MYHSM provides a bank-grade HSM-as-a-service solution without the need for expensive infrastructure.”

NETELLER, a leading digital wallet provider and part of Paysafe Group, is now offering its customers the opportunity to instantly buy and sell cryptocurrencies, as cryptocurrency adoption continues to grow. As of today, NETELLER users can buy, hold and sell cryptocurrencies via a recognised cryptocurrency exchange including Bitcoin, Bitcoin Cash, Ethereum, Ethereum Classic and Litecoin, purchased using any one of 28 fiat currencies available in the NETELLER wallet. 

Today’s launch follows Paysafe’s cryptocurrency service for customers of Skrill, another digital wallet powered by the Paysafe Group, which has proved very popular. Launching the cryptocurrency service in the NETELLER digital wallet was the payment provider’s natural next step.

All customers need to do is log in to their account, select ‘Crypto’ and in just a couple of clicks they have access to buy and sell cryptocurrencies, which are purchased and held by NETELLER via a recognised cryptocurrency exchange.

NETELLER’s new cryptocurrency service is already live in ten countries with plans to roll it out to more than 50 additional markets over the coming weeks and months and to extend the service to its NETELLER mobile app.

Other features of the NETELLER wallet include the ability for customers to upload funds with multiple payment options and currencies. The speed and efficiency of setting up a new user account means that customers can start buying and selling cryptocurrencies quickly and easily.

Lorenzo Pellegrino, CEO Skrill, NETELLER and Income Access, commented:

“The large amount of investment in technology and overall innovation in cryptocurrency has led to the rapid evolution of this space. As cryptocurrencies are increasingly embraced by businesses and consumers alike, this is an industry where we continue to strengthen our presence.  As digital finance leaders, we believe we can play a significant role here and create value for both the industry and consumers. Connecting the dots between cryptocurrencies and traditional money in an efficient and user-friendly way is needed for cryptocurrencies to gain real traction amongst consumers. At Paysafe, we are in a great position to facilitate that through our leading digital wallets and other payment products.”