The Financial Supervisory Commission (FSC) on Thursday issued guidelines on financial institutions sharing data, allowing companies to exchange customer data such as transaction records, account information or Internet protocol (IP) addresses in a bid to boost efficiency and precision marketing, but the sharing would need the customer’s consent, FSC Deputy Chairwoman Jean Chiu (邱淑貞) told a news conference in New Taipei City.
Customers might agree to their data being shared with another financial institution as they would not need to fill out new forms and “know your customer” (KYC) reviews could be completed quicker, Chiu said, citing an example of a customer of a bank who wants to open an account at the bank’s affiliate securities company.
“If data are shared, the application process would be more convenient,” she said.
The commission allows financial institutions to share customers’ IP addresses, as such information can help them detect possible fraud, but institutions must still conduct their own KYC review, even if they have obtained another company’s KYC data for the customer, she said.
Financial institutions could also share a customer’s negative information, such as their default records, if the customer consents, but the company receiving the negative information must check that the data are correct, FSC Department of Planning Director-General Brenda Hu (胡則華) said.
The new regulations are expected to help financial institutions improve their marketing, as they would have better knowledge of a customer’s preferences, behaviors and risks, Chiu said.
The guidance would also allow companies to share data with securities and futures brokers, as the latter seldom share data with other companies except for information on possible money laundering, the commission said.
The commission would allow data to be shared between a financial conglomerate and its business units, between an independent financial company and its subsidiaries, and between one independent company and another independent company, Chiu said.
In the first two examples, companies could set up a joint database to store customer information and perform risk assessments, while for the third example, companies must determine how long they would exchange data with each other and how they would handle that data when the partnership comes to an end, the commission said.
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