Paysafe study shows consumers still favor passwords over biometics

Paysafe Group issued a new report showing a majority of consumers feared that the switch to biometrics would expose them to a greater risk of identity theft than using passwords.

The London-based company said that 81% of consumers still prefer passwords  due to concerns about the effectiveness of biometrics. The report shows that 56% of consumers fear the shift to biometrics will expose them to identity fraud.

The research comes amid a movement in the digital security industry to move authentication methods away from password-based authentication towards biometrics, including fingerprints, facial recognition or other tools.

"Biometrics are a huge opportunity for the payments industry to combat the increasing risk of card not present fraud," Daniel Kornitzer, chief business development officer at Paysafe Group, said, in a company release. "However its not surprising that there is a reluctance among consumers to use biometrics as a form of payment authentication when passwords and PINs have been the central pillar of financial data security for at least 20 years."

The report examines consumer attitudes towards payment authentication just three months before the new Strong Customer Authentication standard is scheduled for implementation across much of Europe.

The research, commissioned by Paysafe and supported by London-based agency Loudhouse, involved surveys of 6,197 consumers across the U.S., U.K., Canada, Germany, Austria and Bulgaria.

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