2023 has proven to be another year of rapid developments within the UK and Europe’s wider payments and fintech landscape when it pertains to innovation, regulation and security.
In this first of a two-parter, Payment Expert assembled several industry experts to lend their views on the opportunities and challenges this year presented that defined 2023 and how this will ultimately transcend into 2024.
Alex Mifsud, CEO & Co-Founder at Weavr: ‘A New Approach to Regulation is Taking Shape’
“In the past year, I think we’ve seen regulators take the first steps towards a new regulatory approach.
“This approach challenges financial service providers in the UK and beyond: the shift towards outcome-based regulation, progressing from foundational efforts like the UK’s Consumer Duty.
“This shift mandates a focus on the end results of actions within the financial sector, rather than merely assessing and addressing the risks involved. The Financial Conduct Authority (FCA) is a proponent of outcome-based regulation, recognising its dual capacity to safeguard and foster innovation.
“This method is broad in application, especially relevant for emerging trends, including highly specific interventions like Authorised Push Payment Fraud Compensation, and more wide-ranging concerns such as the application of AI, where the FCA is already applying outcome-based regulatory strategies.
“At Weavr, we have been tuning our compliance-as-a-service approach to provide the right tools for these upcoming changes.”
Pav Gill, CEO & Founder of Confide: ‘A New Era of Whistleblowing is Being Born’
“Over the past few years, there’s been a steady increase in whistleblowing cases, fueled by heightened awareness and growing employee empowerment. At Confide, we expect 2024 to be no different.
“Thankfully, through greater access to information and a societal shift towards valuing transparency and ethical conduct, employees are becoming more confident in voicing concerns about corporate misconduct.
“This trend will be supported by new legal protections for whistleblowers and the growing influence of social media as a platform for raising awareness about corporate malpractices. In response, companies will need to adapt by implementing robust internal reporting mechanisms and cultivating a culture of openness and accountability.
“In a bid to bolster this, innovative tools, such as those provided by Confide, are now emerging to make this process more manageable.”
Tamas Kadar, CEO and Co-Founder of SEON: ‘Online Fraud Prevention Has Continued to Evolve in the Face of New Threats’
“In 2023, fraud has continued to emerge as one of the most common forms of crime affecting businesses across Europe.
“In certain regions, like the UK, fraud offences have increased by 25% in the past three years alone. Unfortunately, there’s little evidence to suggest that this trend won’t continue in 2024. As we head into the new year, fraudsters are refining their methods, making it harder for businesses to detect and mitigate their threat.
“This continued evolution is rendering certain aspects of traditional online fraud prevention more outdated. For example, traditional rule-based systems are becoming increasingly challenging to maintain due to their rigidity and the sheer amount of data they need to analyse.
“Although testing accuracy with a confusion matrix is helpful, its practicality is limited by the need for significant investment, particularly in human resources.”
