Directory

OBIE encourages eIDAS debate via webinar on FCA Consultation

17 September 2020
directory

On Tuesday 15th September the Open Banking Implementation Entity (OBIE) welcomed over 300 representatives from across its ecosystem to a two-hour webinar focussing on the Financial Conduct Authority’s (FCA) recently announced Consultation on eIDAS certificates (see pages 8 to 12, with the legal instruments on pages 35 to 38).

The eIDAS certificates currently govern the technical manner in which firms within OBIE’s open banking ecosystem confirm their identity and regulatory status prior to sharing customers’ sensitive financial data. The OBIE webinar was an opportunity for the industry to discuss the impact of the revocation of eIDAS certificates, understand technical alternatives, and the sequence of events between now and the 31st December cut-off date. OBIE is please to have developed this short guide for details, background and a glossary of terms

OBIE presented four potential options for changes to the Technical Directory to support identity certificates other than eIDAS certificates, and curated an extensive Q&A session which covered:

  • the consequences of eIDAS revocation from 1st January 2021
  • options to the FCA for changing the law
  • the impact on ASPSPs, TPPs, and end users
  • queries related to changes to the Technical Directory

An event follow-up document containing the material presented and a replay of the Q&A session is available to download here.

The Consultation runs until the 5th October, and OBIE will be submitting its own response as part of that Consultation. The OBIE strongly encourages open banking ecosystem members to submit their own responses to the Consultation as well, to ensure that the FCA gathers as broad a picture as possible of the industry’s current position, the impact of the planned change, and firms current technical contexts.

Comments may be sent by electronic submission using the form on the FCA’s website or submitted in writing. See p.2 of the Consultation document for more detail.

Additional detail and background to this issue can be found here.

 

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For further information, please contact:

press@openbanking.org.uk

About Us

Open Banking is a new, secure way for customers to take control of their financial data and share it with organisations other than their banks. Open Banking has the power to revolutionise the way we move, manage and make more of our money. For businesses, it is about making the management of cash flow and receiving paymes cheaper and easier. Open Banking will make things simpler, faster and more convenient.

Open Banking follows the Competition and Markets Authority (CMA) investigation into the supply of personal current accounts (PCAs) and of banking services to small and medium-sized enterprises (SMEs).

Open Banking was created to enable innovation, transparency and competition in UK financial services. It is tasked with delivering the Application Programming Interfaces (APIs), data structures and security architectures that will enable developers to harness technology, making it easy and safe for individuals and SMEs to share the financial information held by their banks with third parties.

Open Banking will bring substantial benefits. It gives customers and SMEs greater market choice and greater control over their money and associated data, along with better and easier access to new financial services providers in a secure environment.

Notes to Editors:

1. Open Banking Ltd was set up by the Competition & Markets Authority (CMA) in September 2016 to fulfil one of the remedies mandated by the CMA following an investigation into UK retail banking.

2. The CMA’s investigation into the retail banking market (whose findings were published in August 2016) concluded that older and larger banks do not compete hard enough for customers’ business and that Open Banking should deliver a new, secure option for customers to be able to compare the deal they are getting from their bank.

3. Open Banking was created to enable innovation, transparency and competition to UK financial services. It is tasked with delivering the Application Programming Interfaces (APIs), data structures and security architectures that will make it easy and safe for customers to share their financial records by January 2018.

4. The data provided by Open Banking will enable developers to harness technology that allows individuals and businesses to share their financial records held by their banks with third parties.

5. Open Banking is a private body; its governance, composition and budget was determined by the CMA. It is funded by the UK’s nine largest current account providers and overseen by the CMA, the Financial Conduct Authority and Her Majesty’s Treasury.

6. The 9 mandated institutions (referred to as the CMA9) are: Barclays plc, Lloyds Banking Group plc, Santander, Danske, HSBC, RBS, Bank of Ireland, Nationwide and AIBG.