Singapore's OCBC and the Netherland's ING on Tuesday became the latest two banks to launch Touch ID-enabled mobile banking apps, underlining the broadening geographic spread of banks adopting the biometric technology.OCBC's app allows customers to view their balances – bank accounts, cards and investment – on their smartphones without having to log in to mobile banking with usernames and passwords.Meanwhile, ING has also mentioned plans to expand its capability by the summer to also confirm payments.A OCBC spokesman confirmed to the New Straits Times that the bank does not store any account numbers, balances or other related information on the phone. He added that the bank's active mobile banking customer base grew 53 per cent over the past year, and the number of financial transactions on mobile banking doubled.”No other bank in Singapore unlocks a complete online view of a customer's bank account, card and investment balances via fingerprint verification,” it said in a press release.ING said it's the first bank in the Netherlands to offer the service, after already launching fingerprint recognition in Belgium last November. Voice recognition also was introduced last year on the mobile banking app. Around 2.1 million customers use the app, with around 2.2 million long-ins per day. In February, RBS and NatWest became the first major British banks to launch similar apps, with a number of major US banks also preparing similar applications.Note: Biometrics in banking is a major focus of the connect:ID event to be held in Washington D.C on 23-35 March, with a number of end-users, experts and companies talking on the subject.

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