“…a citizen can walk up to an MOM ATM and scan their finger, and then the ATM will match their biometrics to their Aadhaar profile, and any associated bank accounts.”
Indian citizens can now withdraw cash from ATMs with a simple fingerprint scan, and no need for a physical banking card.
The biometric ATMs come by way of MoneyOnMobile, a mobile phone-based payment network, in collaboration with its banking partners. The company’s new MOM ATMs are designed to scan users’ fingerprints, and to link with Aadhaar, India’s ubiquitous biometric national ID program, via the government-led Aadhaar Enabled Payment System (or “AePS”) program. This means that a citizen can walk up to an MOM ATM and scan their finger, and then the ATM will match their biometrics to their Aadhaar profile, and any associated bank accounts.
MoneyOnMobile says it has already activated 3,000 of the new biometric ATMs, and that it’s planning another 3,000 activations “in the coming months,” according to a statement from the company. Its long-term goal is to have 30,000 MOM ATMs in operation by the end of next year.
Of course, the MOM ATM isn’t the first biometric ATM in the world, but it’s certainly on the vanguard of what could become a big new trend. And its link to Aadhaar is indeed pioneering, helping to further establish the latter as the world’s most ambitious and wide-ranging biometric ID program in the world.
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