ADVERTISEMENT
Advertise with BNC

Financial Inclusion, Digital Identity and the White House

Just to mop up the final discussions at the White House FinTech summit, there was a fourth panel on financial inclusion.

Just to mop up the final discussions at the White House FinTech summit, there was a fourth panel on financial inclusion.  This panel comprised, from left to right:

Gayle Smith, Administrator, USAID; Jo Ann Barefoot, Senior Fellow, Mossovar-Rahmani Center for Business & Government, Harvard Kennedy School; Greta Bull, CEO, CGAP (Consultative Group to Assist the Poor); Ryan Falvey, Managing Director, Financial Solutions Lab, Center for Financial Services Innovation; Franz Paasche, VP, Corporate Affairs and Communications, PayPal; and Vikas Raj, Director of Investments, Accion Ventures Lab

This was also an interesting panel with Franz from PayPal noting that “the best way to shut down corruption is to digitalise cash”.  This is so true.  Vikas built on this by recognising that mobile services like Easypaisa in Pakistan and M-Paisa in Afghanistan move money straight from government accounts to the account of the target user.  This is a very powerful driver as the user is in control and the middleman which, in several economies is a corruptive influence, is avoided or ignored.  That is a key.  As Greta noted making “customers feel empowered and in control is a key, which is what drove M-Pesa” in Kenya.

The panel went on to talk about blockchain for identity.  Combine blockchain digital identities, based upon a mobile biometric fingerprint or eyeball, with a mobile wallet that has interoperability and standards, and you have a transformational moment. You can see this in Tanzania, where operators are building the rule book, and you can then see a near-term future arising out of Africa where a cheap mobile identity scheme takes over the world (as blogged about the other week).

This cheap and easy digital identity program is actually being pioneered by India where Aadhaar, the digital identity card rolled out by the Indian government to almost a billion people so far, has laid the bedrock for a mobile financial inclusion program that is truly transformational.  Aadhaar has taken years to rollout – it’s not finished yet – but is the basis for the Universal Payments Interface (UPI) which allows any Indian to pay any other Indian via a mobile, cheaply and easily.  The Unified Payments Interface (UPI) was launched in early April, and lets users use their mobile as a way to authenticate identity, essentially turning the phone into a debit card that can be used anywhere.

A few other discussions highlighted how government also has to compete with tech developments.  For example, after the healthcare.gov disaster, US government has hired more techies and rock star developers from Silicon Valley than banks.  Around 300 techies joined USDS after the Healthcare.gov disaster and the CFPB (Consumer Financial Protection Bureau) is one of the most technically advanced government departments, according to many.

In a separate discussion, Anjan Mukherjee, Counsellor to the Secretary of the US Department of Treasury, talked about cybersecurity and outlined that there are four pillars to the US government approach to cyber security

First, there is the Financial Services Information Sharing and Analysis Centre, which networks 7,000 banks and non-banks to share knowledge of their cyber defences.  Second there is the NIST framework, which allows standardisation for cybersecurity to take place.  Then there are lots of simulations of cyberattacks, run by various agencies and, finally, the Treasury proactively targets to shut down threats.

This work is important because a cyberattack on the financial system can have a ripple effect across the whole economy.  That is why the G7 has a cyber working group, co-chaired by The Treasury and Bank of England, to develop a common cyber security framework of best practices that will be universally applicable to banks, financial institutions, FinTech and tech providers and more.

Roy L. Austin Junior, Deputy Assistant to the President for Urban Affairs, Justice and Opportunity, talked about civil rights and big data.  This was intriguing as he mentioned the data about hate crimes in America.  Roy noted that the department gets race crime data from 2014. It’s out of date when they get it.  It’s also probably not accurate.  For example, in 2014, the data stated that there were 759 hate crimes in California. How many in Alabama? 9.  In Mississippi? 1.

That doesn’t sound quite right, but that’s the only data set the Department for Urban Affairs, Justice and Opportunity has to deal with. In an impassioned speech, Roy make clear that this has to change and that Big Data can make that change.

So there you go.   A comprehensive update of the White House FinTech Summit, which I felt privileged to attend.  The whole day was organised by the one and only Adrienne A. Harris, Special Assistant to the President for Economic Policy at the National Economic Council, and a good friend.

Adrienne also summarised the day in her blog.  Here’s to the next time.  Cheers Adrienne.

Chris Skinner is Chair of the European networking forum: the Financial Services Club. He is best known as an independent commentator on Fintech through his blog, and as author of the bestselling book Digital Bank and its new sequel ValueWeb.


ADVERTISE WITH BRAVE NEW COIN

BNC AdvertisingPlanning your 2024 crypto-media spend? Brave New Coin’s combined website, podcast, newsletters and YouTube channel deliver over 500,000 brand impressions a month to engaged crypto fans worldwide.
Don’t miss out – Find out more today


ADVERTISEMENT
Advertise with BNC
ADVERTISEMENT
Advertise with BNC
BNC Newsletters: A weekly digest of the most important news and analysis.
ADVERTISEMENT
Advertise with BNC
Submit an event on bravenewcoin.com
Latest Insights More
ADVERTISEMENT
Advertise with BNC