KYC (Know Your Customer)

KYC (Know Your Customer) refers to the set of identity verification procedures that a company applies to its customers before entering into a business relationship. Historically imposed on banks by anti-money laundering directives, KYC has extended to high-stakes electronic signature operations: account opening, credit, insurance, notarial deeds. KYC rests on three pillars: identity document verification (OCR + fraud detection), liveness check (proof that the person is real and present), and information cross-checking. The eIDAS regulation recognises video KYC as a means of identifying a signatory for a qualified signature (QES).