Inlaks, an ICT infrastructure and solutions provider, in support of the CBN’s financial inclusion programme, has introduced Hyosung Finger Print Biometric Automatic Teller Machines (ATMs) into the Nigerian market.
Announcing the latest innovation from Inlaks, its Managing Director/CEO, African Operations, Mr. Femi Adeoti, said the latest development is in line with the company’s core vision of delivering greater value and benefits to the financial sector of the Nigerian economy and the West African region.
Adeoti, who described the deployment of the new Hyosung finger print biometric ATMs as a giant stride for the organisation, explained that the fingerprint biometric ATMs do not only provide convenience and security to the diverse customer segments in Nigeria but also align with the financial inclusion strategy of the Central Bank of Nigeria to address the unbanked population, using ATM as a channel.
“This is a great feat for Inlaks especially at this period when fraud prevention and building customer confidence on the use of electronic channels are key to customer acquisition and the retention strategies of the financial institutions,” he said.
He added that with the introduction of this technology which is globally acclaimed as one of the most secure forms of customer identification on ATMs, Inlaks has again demonstrated its leadership in the delivery of innovative solutions and compliance with market regulations.
Inlaks became the first ATM vendor in Nigeria to deliver Windows7 ATMs from Hyosung to the market early last year in compliance with the CBN and Microsoft global directive on exit of Windows XP on ATMs.
Explaining how the fingerprint biometric ATM work, Inlaks’ Director for Sales and Strategy for e-business, Mr. Tope Dare, said “The new security technology on Hyosung ATMs would be available to existing cardholders, who may wish to adopt biometric authentication as part of their transaction approval process on their bank’s Biometric enabled ATMs.”
This, he added, would be in addition to PIN selection while new cardholders, especially those who can neither read nor write, would be issued cards with finger-print authentication functionality only.
“This will also promote financial inclusion strategy, a central bank initiative to address the banking needs of the unbanked population,” he said.
He further explained that the ongoing Biometric Verification Number (BVN) project by banks and the Nigeria Inter Bank Settlement System (NIBSS), which was meant to address the safety of customers’ funds and eliminate loss of funds through compromise of account Personal Identification Number (PIN], would be seamlessly integrated with Hyosung’s fingerprint ATMs already being deployed to some commercial banks in Nigeria.
Hyosung ATMs and kiosks are becoming the fastest growing ATMs and kiosks in the self-service market in Nigeria today having sold and deployed about 3000 units of the brand to more than 15 banks in Nigeria in the last two years.
Inlaks’ success, according to Dare, is premised on the company’s commitment to its customer-centric approach of building a long term and mutually beneficial partnership with its customers and also providing cutting-edge solutions for a profitable growth of businesses.