Increasingly, companies need to be certain that customers are who they claim to be. This trust forms the foundation between a business and customers that begins with onboarding and continues as engagements deepen. To know who customers are online, businesses need a way to reliably verify them. But how do teams choose the right identity verification platform to build trust, and why does it even matter?
In this article, we will explain why online identity verification is essential for digital services, what the basics steps to verify an identity are, and compare Passbase and Veriff’s products and compare the services to enable these processes.
Solving the identity verification challenge
The Covid-19 pandemic has cataylized the adoption of digital services for everything from government services to health care. Industries that have been slow to go digitalize have had to find online solutions overnight. At the same time, digital native companies with innovative services such as crypto for for esports and content creation have been required to rapidly adjust to new regulations.
Businesses with online services and products today need a secure way to find out who their customers are, whether it’s for financial transactions to reduce fraud or confirming that someone is over 18 to participate in online gaming and eSports tournaments. As newly regulated industries are facing serious financial and regulatory sanctions for failing to meet compliance standards, finding the appropriate identity verification solution, without compromising on user experience, will help businesses thrive in the coming years.
Understanding how verification services identify an individual and the features that make their platforms secure and user-friendly will help teams identify the solution that fits their needs from an industry and product standpoint.
An overview of verification services
Both Passbase and Veriff provide identity verification services to companies around the world with the goal of making the internet a safer space. Passbase also believes in creating a more accessible identity infrastructure that can power a more human internet. Both companies offer identity verification services that scale can scale based on demand.
Generally, both companies offer identity verification services that help companies identify their customers (KYC) in order to fulfill anti-money laundering (AML) or other regulatory requirements. Identity verification is also often applied for other scenarios that require some form of verification to build trust, such as document validity checks, age verification, and biometric user authentication for logins or transactions.
A typical identity verification flow includes offering an end user the option to:
- Select a document type to upload
- Take a photo of a government-issued photo ID (such as a passport, driver’s license or national ID card)
- Take a selfie to face match the person who’s submitting the document with the information on the photo ID
- Receive instant feedback of their identity verification status (success or failure)
Service providers may have different approaches to handling identity verification based on the industries they serve and the ways they use technology to meet regulatory compliance requirements and increase security against fraud.
Services
Both Passbase and Veriff offer a number of services to meet regulatory requirements, such as AML/CFT requirements in the US, EU, or other markets with growing regulations.
Passbase enables companies to perform:
- KYC checks with official ID for AML/CTF requirements
- Watchlist and database checks for AML/CTF requirements
- Age verification for age-restricted goods and services
- Additional industry-specific document submissions
Veriff focuses on identity verification with official ID documents and proof of address, with a high check automation rate to increase speed. Veriff can send webhook notifications immediately after each step is completed to speed up verification completion.
Both companies offer global document coverage in 190 countries, meaning that companies can serve cross-border customers from day one. We also recommend that companies focus on asking providers about coverage in their focus markets or specific types of documents supported. For example, Passbase also supports insurance card scans for the US and globally, and CDC Covid-19 vaccination card scans for industries such as health care and events.
Products
Passbase’s core identity verification engine is an end-to-end verification that can be integrated into web and mobile products. The verification platform is designed to help companies assemble the verification flow that meets both their regulatory requirements and operational needs, whether it is in crypto or mobility.
Both Passbase and Veriff offer essential products such as identity verification, liveness detection, facial matching and biometric authentication, as well as database and watchlist checks.
Both companies also offer workflow and branding customization options based on tiers.
Approaches to Verification
Companies performing identity verification also have different approaches to handling risk. Veriff has a binary pass or fail approach while Passbase has a confidence score and allows businesses to set their own auto-reject or accept thresholds. Passbase’s confidence score enables businesses choose a threshold that makes the most sense for their industry and workflow. For example, businesses can opt to accept verifications with a 90% confidence score, manually check ones down to 80% confidence, and reject the remainder in order to balance risk tolerance and customer friction.
Security
Both Passbase and Veriff serve global clients that have to meet security considerations when choosing identity verification providers. For example, both companies are compliant with CCPA, GDPR and SOC2 Type II requirements.
Integration
Passbase has a large set of integration options that developers can test immediately. These include client-side SDKs with iOS, Android, React Native, Flutter, as well as React, Angular, Javascript, and a Hosted integration. Passbase also has server-side support with webhooks, server-side libraries, and an API. Passbase also has a no-code/low-code solution and hosted web link.
Passbase’s verification flow is highly customizable and clients can tailor their verification flow to their needs through Passbase dashboard or through API configurations. Changes can be made and updated in real-time through simple drag-and-drop.
Veriff has SDKs for mobile, React Native, Javascript, as well as a API integration and Flutter plugin.
Both platforms have customer support on platforms such as Slack.
Pricing
Passbase operates on the model of empowering companies with the same identity verification and security features irrespective of their identity verification volume. To that end, Passbase has the following plans that are transparently priced:
- Startup: $83 platform fee and $1.49 per verification
- Growth: $249 platform fee and $1.29 per verification
- Enterprise: Customized
It is possible to upgrade or downgrade plans based on needs. All plans come with:
- Document authentication
- Complete data extraction points for ID cards
- Facial comparison
- Liveness test
- Webhook and API access
- Mobile and server-side SDKs
Additional features such as watchlist checks, database checks, and additional document checks can also be added.
In addition, Growth and Enterprise plans come with advanced customization options for a branded identity verification flow, biometric authentication, reusable documents, and multiple project environments.
Veriff has four plans: Essential, Plus, Premium, and Enterprise. The prices displayed at the time of writing include:
- Essential: $1.49 per verification
- Plus: $1.89 per verification
- Premium: $2.05 per verification
- Custom enterprise options
Plans come with basic functionalities and have no platform fees. Note that some plans may have limited data storage and extraction points and not include custom logos and media downloads. For example, data points such as Date of Issue or gender beyond the first 5 for ID cards may incur additional fees. Upgraded plans also include more functionalities. It is important to understand exactly what each of these plans offers to ensure that they capture the information necessary for your compliance or security needs.
Final Considerations
When testing out solutions, consider both core functionality and strategic factors. Choose a solution that is robust and secure, but also offers other opportunities to use identity verification to enhance security and customer experience.
Coverage
Ultimately, choosing a provider may come down to coverage needs that could include the markets, types of documents, and language support.
Both Veriff and Passbase support a range of ID documents necessary for basic identity verification. Passbase also supports additional documents and checks such as proof of address, utility bills, credit cards, and bank statements, as well as CDC vaccination card scans. With additional document support, Passbase’s identity verification engine powers companies that can range from healthcare and real estate to crypto.
Customizability
Because identity verification is also used to build trust customers, having an embedded verification flow in your product builds confidence with end users. Customizability includes both workflows and the product interface.
Passbase’s Growth plan features are designed for companies that are ready to embed identity verification throughout their product or product lines, and need multiple verification flows as well as brand customization. Passbase also offers multilanguage support for 16 languages, which come with existing translations that can support customized copywriting for Growth plan clients.
Cost
Pricing will always be key factor for businesses, so understanding the pricing model and true cost is essential for choosing a service provider. While both Passbase and Veriff charge per verification, understanding the true cost per verification based on the data you collect will be key. Passbase operates on a simple cost structure where verification costs decrease with volume and core functionalities for compliance are covered from the Startup Plan and up to help companies quickly integrate a complete identity verification into their product.
Conclusion
Both Passbase and Veriff provide thoughtful verification services for companies that could require seasonal or consistently high-volume identity verifications. The difference in approaches can reflect the types of customers the companies are serving. Veriff offers lean pricing to give companies an approachable entry point into identity verification, with the understanding that companies can pay for the additional features they require.
Passbase has approached identity verification from the perspective of elevating user experiences without compromising security, for both client companies as well as end users. You can explore Passbase’s features by clicking here.
