Judy Winn
Combining AI, ML, network intelligence and next-generation payment hubs can reduce risk in real-time payments, according to payments experts at the ACI Worldwide Payments Intelligence Roadshow, in Johannesburg.
Outlining trends in global payments and new risks inherent in instant payments, ACI Worldwide experts noted that technologies such as cloud native payment hubs, advanced data analytics and AI are making it safer for banks and financial institutions to embrace modernisation while remaining compliant and mitigating risk.
Judy Winn, Head of Information Security and Governance at Peach Payments, stated that the rapid acceleration of digital payment scams and fraud poses a significant risk to consumers, as humans remain the most vulnerable link in the value chain.
“For many merchants, security is a grudge purchase, but it shouldn’t be. For merchants and financial institutions, AI and LLMs allow us to pre-empt attacks, using years of aggregated data to enhance the models,” Winn said.
Damon Madden, Regional Solution Consultant and Fraud Expert – MEASA at ACI Worldwide, stated that as payments evolved to meet the demand for instant, seamless transactions, so did the tactics used by fraudsters to target customers. “Real-time payments come with risks because of their immediacy. We’re seeing more authorised push payment (APP) scams and AI-driven threats,” he said.
Scotty Perkins
Madden said AI technology is playing a crucial role in enhancing security, as the use of AI and data analytics can provide real-time insights into potential fraud. Financial institutions can learn from data signals and share the signals themselves. In some countries, there is a growing interest in exchanging intelligence (the signals from data) between issuing and receiving banks to identify high-risk transactions, for example.
He said the adoption of ISO 20022, the new standard for financial messaging, offered a framework for richer data communication between parties, allowing banks to embed data intelligence and make transactions more transparent and secure.
Madden noted that ACI Worldwide has been using AI for more than two decades, in areas such as Payments Intelligence for analytics and fraud solutions, customer service and software development and modernisation.
Yvonne Elford, Africa Commercial Lead at ACI Worldwide, stated that ACI Worldwide is focused on unlocking the power of data and AI to enable smarter and safer payments in Africa.
Yvonne Elford
ACI Payments Intelligence is delivering predictive modelling with multiple AI models running in parallel to address the top four fraud trends: anomaly detection, account takeover, pre- and post-authorisation for bank declines, and friendly fraud.
ACI solutions alert on specific fraud types by classification for faster, informed decisions and higher precision. ACI Worldwide has pioneered best-in-class, patented AI and ML capabilities to deliver precise and actionable intelligence in real-time, mitigate financial and reputational risks, and power an enriched payment experience.
Setting new standards for payments modernisation
Scotty Perkins, EVP – Head of Product Management at ACI Worldwide, highlighted how global banks depend on ACI Worldwide to address the requirements of real-time payments, digitisation initiatives and fraud prevention.
“ACI Worldwide conducted a survey in 2024 about the top priorities for banks and large financial institutions around the world and found that 75% said their biggest priority was modernisation,” he said. “Banks are having a difficult time innovating and bringing new products to market using their legacy payment systems. In addition, legacy systems tend to be very siloed and they don’t have easily obtainable visibility across all different payment types.
Damon Madden
“It introduces this interesting struggle – on one hand, payments have to be the most operationally resilient, scalable and reliable function of the bank. They are mission-critical and they have to work. So we have this struggle of balancing the forces of running the bank, maintaining that operational resilience and compliance, with growing the business and bringing new products and capabilities to market with new technologies like instant payments and AI.”
To achieve these goals, financial institutions are increasingly investing in payment hubs as a critical component of a contemporary banking system, according to a payment hub study by Datos Insights on why banks must move ahead with urgency.
“For the first time in the industry, ACI Worldwide is developing a new, harmonised platform. We are building a fully modern, cloud-native platform – ACI Connetic – a flexible platform that enables the intelligent orchestration of payments and services, allowing you to interact with the platform through APIs. It all sits on top of one common payments intelligence layer; so for the first time in the industry, those different types of payments are all on one data and AI runtime in a common cloud-native platform,” Perkins said.
Connetic is built for high-volume, real-time processing to support various payment types, including account-to-account (A2A), card transactions and ACH payments. ACI Worldwide says the platform is particularly suited for banks looking to modernise quickly and cost-effectively without sacrificing enterprise-grade capabilities.
