Citibank Thailand has rolled out a voiceprint authentication service for retail customers, in a bid to shorten the identity verification process to 15 seconds.
The system will be a feature of CitiPhone Banking, one of its service channels for retail customers.
With the technology, customers who access basic financial transactions through CitiPhone Banking will be able to verify transactions by voice without using passwords or answering personal questions.
"The voiceprint will increase security by encoding the readout as binary code to ensure that nobody can imitate their voice," said Citibank Thailand country manager Darren Buckley.
When customers call and sign up for the service, the system records and stores their voice as a voiceprint. Customers will also answer personal data questions for further identity verification purposes that may be required in the future.
Once registration is complete, a text or email notification will be sent within 2-4 hours, after which customers can start to use Citibank's Voice Biometrics service via CitiPhone Banking.
This service enhances security in the financial sector, enabling voice authentication for most basic customer needs, such as querying due dates and amounts for credit card payments, said Vira-anong Chiranakhorn Phutrakul, consumer business manager.
For certain higher risk financial transactions, however, such as change of a customer's demographic data, Citi's customers will still be asked additional security questions.
Citibank has already unveiled voice biometrics authentication in several Asian markets, including Singapore and Hong Kong.
"The processing time will be shortened to only 15 seconds from around 60 seconds with password authentication," Ms Vira-anong said.
The bank's retail customer base in Thailand numbers around 1.6 million, of which 1 million are credit card holders, and the remaining 600,000 are those who use Ready Credit and personal loans.
Ms Vira-anong expects the voice recognition technology to receive a warm welcome with 10-30% of retail customers applying for it.