In an exclusive interaction with CXO Media and APAC Media, Movin Jain, Founder, Skydo, a cross-border payments platform explains the leverage of AI and blockchain in global payment transactions and enhance the security and efficiency of cross-border payments.
As the founder of Skydo, how do you see artificial intelligence transforming the global payments landscape, and how is Skydo leveraging AI to enhance efficiency and security?
Artificial intelligence has the potential of reshaping global payments by making them safer, faster, and more cost-efficient. AI-driven fraud detection and compliance screening can remove many of the bottlenecks that slow down cross-border transactions. Manual verification of transactions and customer details has always been time-consuming, resource-intensive, and prone to errors. AI can change the game by automating risk assessments, drastically reducing false positives while ensuring genuine threats don’t go unnoticed. This frees up compliance teams to focus on serious threats that would have otherwise taken a long time to identify.
At Skydo, we leverage AI significantly in customer acquisition and in risk management. In the former, we use AI to customize the experience for different customer segments and needs, and address their queries faster. In the latter, AI helps us minimize fraud risks by detecting anomalies in KYB/KYC data, flagging suspicious transactions, and screening signups against global sanctions lists. AI also automates compliance checks, reducing human intervention and accelerating verification. In conclusion, AI has huge potential to make cross-border payments faster, more secure and more efficient. Skydo has taken robust initiatives to leverage this potential, and is looking to grow these initiatives as AI advancements continue to emerge.
Do you see blockchain playing a role in Skydo’s future payment solutions? How do you view its potential in transforming cross-border payments?
Blockchain technology serves as the foundation for Central Bank Digital Currencies (CBDCs) and Stablecoins, providing a modern ledger system that significantly enhances security, reduces fraud risks, and lowers transaction costs. It has the potential to facilitate faster and more efficient money movement across borders, currencies and ecosystems.
At Skydo we continuously evaluate emerging technologies that could help us improve our offering to customers. We recognise the potential of blockchain, and are working on a few use cases that might make cross-border transactions faster and cheaper. However, we also need to also take into account the regulatory posture towards blockchain, CBDCs and Stablecoins, and ensure that regulatory expectations are met adequately while adopting these new technologies.
With increasing global transactions, how does Skydo use AI-driven solutions to detect fraud and ensure compliance with international regulations?
AI plays a crucial role in Skydo’s KYC, Risk Management and Regulatory Compliance activities AI-powered automation enables real-time monitoring of transactions, identifying anomalies and reducing manual intervention. Specifically, we use AI for image and video analysis, document verification, and transaction behaviour monitoring. AI also monitors transaction patterns, flagging suspicious activity that deviates from normal behaviour.
What are some of the biggest challenges in integrating AI into cross-border payment systems, and how is Skydo addressing them?
While AI can create significant efficiencies in cross-border payments, it also comes with its challenges and risks. Because AI models are predictive in nature, inaccuracies can creep in. In the risk management and regulatory compliance world, these errors can be fatal and need to be carefully prevented or mitigated.
Another challenge with AI solutions is maintaining Data Privacy, with particular focus on India’s DPDP Act, as well as Europe’s GDPR and other such regulations worldwide. At Skydo, security is a priority. We recently achieved SOC 2 certification, reinforcing our commitment to data protection. Our AI-driven compliance tools continuously monitor evolving regulations, while encryption and secure AI models ensure complete data privacy.
With AI evolving rapidly, what trends do you believe will shape the future of global payments, and how is Skydo preparing for them?
As global exports continue to grow, we see tremendous tailwinds for global expansion of new-age MSMEs. The ease of building AI-driven products and agents allows these businesses to offer services across multiple countries efficiently. For Skydo, AI is an important enabler in creating a robust and scalable payments ecosystem that can meet the evolving needs of exporters, MSMEs, and freelancers.
AI will play a major role in the shift towards real-time, frictionless payments. Through these targeted applications of AI, we aim to build trust, ensure compliance, and provide a seamless experience for our customers, while contributing to the broader growth of the global export economy.
Bhavya Bagga, APAC Media
