Voice Commerce Group launches new biometric voice signature technology 27th June 2008 By Bhavana Navuluri Voice Commerce Group has developed a voice-based biometric payment and financial transaction processing technology, Voice Transact, to enable the financial services industry to secure payment transactions and reduce fraud and phishing-related scams.

Voice Transact, which has been developed in partnership with Nuance Communications, integrates with all current standards, including Visa and MasterCard Level 1 PC1, ISO 19029, and EU certification 1999/93 for digital certificates within the Single European Payments Area (SEPA).

Nick Ogden, CEO of Voice Commerce Group, said: "Voice Transact signatures will transform the way that banking and financial services transactions are conducted to provide a secure and convenient global standard for worldwide use."

In order to secure payment transactions, banks can ask their consumers to create an anonymous voice signature, which uses a biometric that they then use to sign for payments and other financial transactions. Voice Transact links to VoicePay, a voice-payments system from Voice Commerce Group.

Nuance, a developer of speech systems, has powered the biometric element of Voice Transact. The two companies will roll out the product jointly.

Chuck Buffum, vice president of Authentication Solutions at Nuance Communications, said: "Voice Commerce's payments and financial services expertise is a perfect complement to our own global speech technology and caller authentication capabilities. We believe the Voice Transact service will enable banks to offer new mobile payment services and transactional financial authentication with the security of voice biometrics and ease of use that consumers now demand."