First Time Founders with Ed Elson — ft. Eli Wachs of Footprint | Prof G Markets

Apple's Role

Apple's potential entry into the identity verification industry poses both opportunities and threats. Eli Wachs explains that Apple's cryptographic signature for Face ID offers high-fidelity verification, which could challenge existing players like his company, Footprint 1. However, he believes Apple is unlikely to fully enter the enterprise security space due to its focus on broader markets like Apple banking 1.

Apple cares a lot more about like Apple banking and like owning that than owning like the onboarding ramp to it.

--- Eli Wachs

Wachs also highlights Apple's strategic restraint, suggesting they prefer to enhance the identity industry without dominating it, thus maintaining their PR image 2.

   

Fraud Challenges

Fraud in fintech is a significant challenge, with fake businesses exploiting the system. Eli Wachs notes that companies like Footprint link accounts to identities to combat this issue, ensuring accountability without blacklisting users 3. He emphasizes the importance of secure authentication standards like FIDO2, which major tech companies have adopted to prevent phishing attacks 4.

It's strange that we have to keep doing something. The Internet's supposed to be about undoing monotonous tasks that we normally have to do physically, but identity seems to be the opposite of that.

--- Eli Wachs

Wachs argues for a centralized arbiter in identity verification, contrasting it with the decentralized approach of blockchain, which has not effectively eliminated fraud 4.