Bank of America Upgrades Mobile App Login

Bank of America is expanding its use of biometric authentication on mobile apps while making it easier for customer to switch between them with a new ‘App Linking’ feature.

The feature takes the form of a simple button within each app, allowing end users to immediately switch between their Bank of America, Merrill Lynch, Merrill Edge, and U.S. Trust apps with no need to authenticate again – it’s can all happen essentially within the same session. And as for the login process itself, users can authenticate with a fingerprint scan on their mobile device, or even with Face ID, if they have one of Apple’s newest iPhones.

It’s an expansion of enhanced authentication technology that Bank of America Merrill Lynch brought to its CashPro Mobile app this past summer. While that app is primarily intended for business executives, the financial services firm was evidently quick to conclude that this kind of secure authentication could benefit its millions of other customers too if applied to more mobile apps.

As Merrill Lynch Wealth Management head Andy Sieg explained in a statement announcing the new functionality, “It provides a state-of-the-art mobile platform that allows clients to view their banking and financial assets and activities in one place and to manage the full range of day-to-day transactions with ease.”

The authentication upgrade arrives alongside a number of other improvements to Bank of America Merrill Lynch apps including a new, central dashboard for customer rewards management, enhance customization of alerts, and a personalized cash flow analysis feature.