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Bank customers’ biometric registration begins in 1,000 branches

By on April 29, 2014

The Central Bank of Nigeria has said that the biometric registration of bank customers will now commence May ending in 1,000 bank branches in Lagos.

The development is coming about four months after the project was inaugurated by the CBN and Bankers Committee in Lagos.

Although the registration exercise is currently undergoing a test run in 48 bank offices in Lagos, it is expected to be taken to 5,500 bank offices across the country during the 18 months registration period.

The acting Director, Corporate Communications, CBN, Mr. Isaac Okorafor, who disclosed the new date in Lagos on Friday, said lessons learnt from the public rollout in Lagos would form the basis of taking the registration exercise to other parts of the country later in the year.

He said, “Already, the project is ongoing in some bank branches. We also intend that by the end of May 2014, we will begin to roll out to members of the public. Just as we did during the cashless programme, you know our people are not very educated; they are resistant to anything that has to do with money. But what we intend to do is to start the public rollout here in Lagos, which has more of the bank branches.”

“We are starting with at least 1,000 bank branches. After the enrolment of account holders, we will look at the challenges that are there, how to tackle those challenges and the wisdom we get from there will now help us to begin to plan a rollout after Lagos.”

The biometric registration scheme, also known as Bank Verification Number project, is being executed by Germany-based Dermalog in collaboration with Nigeria’s Chams Plc.

The project, sponsored by the Bankers Committee, is being co-ordinated by the Nigeria Inter-Bank Settlement System Plc.

The suspended CBN Governor, Mr. Lamido Sanusi, who inaugurated the project on February 14 this year, had said after the 18-month registration period, bank customers would not be able to do any banking transaction without their fingerprints.

He noted that the development represented a milestone in the nation’s financial system and economy in general.

According to Sanusi, the new biometric registration will lead to the issuing of BVN, a unique identity for every bank customer, and help to mitigate fraud, money laundering and other vices.

Okorafor also explained that the biometric scheme would help to check fraud, identify theft and enable ordinary people who could neither read nor write to make financial transactions.

He said, “If a person is unable to read and write, he can maintain an account in the bank and enjoy financial services. If you used to be afraid that people will use details of your card to take your money, once a person is enrolled, nobody will be able to do that unless they have to cut your fingers.

“The project will prevent cloned identity, replication. The programme is in the interest of everyone of us. It will help us to fight corruption.”

The CBN director recalled that a number of challenges confronting the banking sector, ranging from fraud to low level of literacy in the country, had led to the emergence the BVN project.

He pointed out that a significant number of people could not key into the central bank’s cashless policy due to illiteracy.

He, however, noted that the BVN would enable a bank customer to have a single identity within the financial system.

The officer in charge of the biometric project at the NIBSS, Mr. Oluseyi Adenumosun, said one of the reasons the Bankers’ Committee introduced the project into the banking industry was to enable them to identify an account holder.

He said the programme would promote accountability and prevent corruption, stressing the most important aspect of the BVN was that the number “cannot be cloned or duplicated and can easily identify an account holder.”

With the introduction of the BVN, Adenumosun maintained that no bank account holder would be required to present identity card, driver licence, and international passport before a transaction could be made.

He said, “We cannot be doing Internet transaction and other cashless transaction without being able to identify you or trace you. So, this project is going to provide unique information technology that identifies you fairly to the banking industry through the use of the BVN.

“Apart from its uniqueness, it also helps in accountability. When you do a transaction, you are identified by that BVN, which gives your biometric information, which is key; that is how we detect that a bank customer in three or four banks is the same person.

“One of the reasons why the Bankers’ Committee went into this is because we want to be able to identify across the industry an account holder. It is possible for a bank’s customer to hold account in different banks using different names. So the Bankers’ Committee felt it was necessary given the state of fraud, given the cashless policy, given the idealistic direction that Central Bank of Nigeria was pursuing, we need something that will hold everything together.”

 

 

[Punch]

One Comment

  1. Thomas Adebiyi

    May 8, 2014 at 1:37 pm

    I hope our fingers will be safe thereafter?!