Banking and Fintech Predictions for Middle East in 2021

Banking and Fintech Predictions for Middle East in 2021

COVID-19 has created a sea change across the financial services sector with respect to remote work and a push for digitisation. The financial sector experienced the most disruption, with an accelerated innovation roadmap that saw manual processes including account opening, lending applications and more become digitised.

In the push to develop online services, security was often an afterthought and bad actors took advantage of the new breach opportunities leading to a surge in systemic fraud over the course of the year. This was a key learning in 2020, and in the MEA region we are likely to see more institutions look to multi-factor authentication (MFA) with new digital technologies like facial recognition and biometrics to better identify and stop fraud. There are great opportunities ahead for the region's banks, here are some key areas that I feel will be important in the MEA region and globally.

Intelligent Authentication will become the norm: Cybercrime has become prolific in the financial sector across the MEA region as rapid digital transformation has given malicious actors the opportunity to exploit holes in security. SIM swapping has been a huge issue, with hackers able to obtain duplicate SIM cards to receive a One Time Password (OTP) via