Niuron, a Spanish banking consortium aimed at fostering blockchain technology, is developing a blockchain platform to verify the digital identity of clients.

Led by Cecabank in collaboration with Grant Thornton, the consortium members include Abanca, Bankia, Caixabank, Caixa Ontinyent, Ibercaja, Kutxabank, Liberbank and Unicaja Banco. It has two key objectives – to act as an observatory to promote knowledge in the technical, legal and business, and to serve as a platform for collaborative projects among entities based on blockchain technology.

This project is the continuation of the proof of concept finalized last September. The blockchain platform is being developed by a subgroup of five members of the consortium – Abanca, Ibercaja, Kutxabank, Liberbank and Unicaja Banco – along with another entity, Caja Ingenieros.

“The purpose is to solve a problem common to all financial institutions, which must ensure the veracity of a customer's identity when they operate with it for the first time. The new platform allows to carry out the checks quickly and safely and always under the explicit consent of the client,” according to the official release (loosely translated).

The project is expected to be completed by the end of 2017. The blockchain platform will allow the digital identity of a client to be shared among different banks, strictly complying with the current data protection regulation (GDPR) and with the highest security standards.

“For entities, the benefits of this platform translate into an increase in speed, cost savings, reduction of fraud, reduction of operational risk and improvement in the prevention of money laundering. The client, meanwhile, decreases the time needed during a registration process and has control and sovereignty over their personal data, thus improving their user experience,” it added.