Nigerian online tech community has called on financial institutions, especially banks, to help provide access to application programme interface (API) and help them with bank verification numbers (BVN) of their customers for authentication of users in the online space.
An API is a set of routine definitions, protocols and tools for building software and applications. It helps to access databases or computer hardware like hard disk drives or video cards and can assist otherwise distinct applications with sharing data, which can help to integrate and enhance the functionalities of the applications.
Speaking at the First Bank Technology talk held in Lagos yesterday, Lekan Olude, co-founder of Jobberman, said most online companies in Nigeria face a difficult task in trying to verify users.
“I think that the API is extremely important for the success of the tech community. In jobberman for example, background check is a big problem. I want to be sure that the company that wants to offer a job opening is not a scam; one of the ways I can verify is through the BVN. Because when we say companies should send CAC documents, they doctor the document and send to us but I know that they can’t doctor a BVN.
“One thing I have realised about the success of a lot of international companies is the fact that they tend to release their API to the world, and it is released because there are tones of companies that have fantastic ideas but they can’t talk to any of them so they release their API in form of basic and advanced access.
“For basic access, you can use it to talk to us to check a candidate’s profile and be sure that they are who they claim to be and advanced access can be to check bank balances and all that. So this is one of the key things that banks might have to do.
“Once banks release that API, they are going to have floods of requests from people asking to use the API for different reasons, it is now the bank’s decision to say whether it can give access to particular information, but at least, that will open up a lot of opportunities for the banking sector to be able to see the fantastic ideas that are coming into the tech space,” Olude said.
Responding to this, Chuma Ezri, head, e-business, FirstBank, said the bank had shared its API with a few companies, but was being careful with opening it up to the public.
“Konga can testify that we have shared our API with them, so they can verify who is actually buying genuinely from their website and who owns the bank account being used for online purchase. We are also into a partnership with MTN and we are planning to expose that to other telcos,” he said.
