In an effort to prevent scams in non-cash transactions, the State Bank of Vietnam (SBV) created a regulation that since July 1, 2024, all transactions of money transfer with value of over VND10 million must undergo facial authentication.

When opening a bank account, an account owner’s face must be checked with the information shown on chip-based identity cards. Also, if the total value of daily transactions reaches VND20 million, they will have to have their faces authenticated again.

These are the provisions of SBV’s Decision No 2345 on deployment of safe and security solutions for online and bank-card payments.

SBV Deputy Governor Pham Tien Dung said at a recent workshop on online scam prevention and control that 91 percent of scams relate to bank accounts. The new regulation which stipulates that all transactions that have value of over VND10 million must undergo facial authentication will strengthen security when making online payments.

According to Dung, bank officers previously found it difficult to identify real and forged documents with the naked eye. But the problem now can be solved by high technology. Chip-based ID cards which will ensure that persons opening bank accounts are real and they are not using forged documents.

With image processing technology now available, Thai Tri Hung, CTO of MoMo e-wallet, said that it takes 2-3 seconds to complete the facial authentication process.

“Our authentication process uses AI-based face recognition technology and anti-scam algorithms. When implementing facial authentication, users need to take a picture of their faces via an app. The system will compare the picture and the photo on chip-based ID cards to conduct identity verification,” he explained.

Ngo Minh Hieu, founder of Chongluadao, commented that the requirement on biometric authentication applied to transactions with high value would minimize information security risks, but there are still vulnerabilities which can be exploited by hackers.

Many victims in scams transferred money to scammers based on false information that they received, but had not verified. In this case, biometric technology could not eliminate fraud, because scammers can persuade victims to conduct transactions.

In another case, if scammers successfully install malware in users’ phones, which allows them to control the devices from a distance and records users’ operations on the devices, including victims’ faces, they can use this information to withdraw money from victims’ accounts.

Trong Dat