PrivatBank, the Ministry of Internal Affairs of Ukraine (MIA), and the State Migration Service of Ukraine (SMS) signed a cooperation agreement aimed at strengthening countermeasures against fraud involving fake documents in the banking sector. The signing was attended by Oleksii Filipov, Deputy Chairman of the Management Board for Risk Management, and Nataliia Naumenko, Head of the State Migration Service of Ukraine.
This is the first precedent of such an information interaction format between a major state-owned bank and the Ministry of Internal Affairs system authorities in Ukraine. The decision on the necessity of integration with the systems of the State Migration Service was elaborated on the initiative of PrivatBank's Security Service and Fraud Management. The main goal is to prevent fraud at the client identification and verification stage and to prevent the opening of bank accounts using forged or invalid passport documents.
As part of the cooperation, PrivatBank will be able to check the validity of passport documents and verify personal data through secure electronic information interaction with the relevant state information resources. Information exchange will be carried out through the Trembita system.
"Such a mechanism will allow shifting the response to a portion of fraudulent schemes to the earliest stage – prior to opening an account and conducting any financial operations. If a forged or invalid document is used to pass banking verification, the bank will have the opportunity to detect the discrepancy during the check and prevent the account from being opened," explained Oleksii Filipov, Deputy Chairman of the Management Board for Risk Management at PrivatBank.
"Combining the capabilities of state information resources with modern banking verification systems gives us the opportunity to act proactively. Our common task is to create conditions under which the use of a forged or invalid document is detected before it becomes a tool for further offenses. Such interaction is a practical example of how the state's digital capabilities can work to protect citizens and the financial system," noted Nataliia Naumenko, Head of the State Migration Service of Ukraine.
The signing of the agreement is the first stage of cooperation. The next step will be the practical implementation of electronic information interaction between the resources of the MIA, SMS, and PrivatBank to check the validity of passport documents and verify personal data.
The introduction of such a mechanism will become another element of the financial fraud prevention system and will allow blocking a portion of criminal schemes even before a bank account is opened for them.
