Voicebot Podcast Episode 86: Vijay Balasubramaniyan CEO of Pindrop
I usually try to carve out some time each weekend to catch up on some podcasts that I missed. This weekend, I wanted to circle back to this specific Voicebot episode because I had heard this was such a great conversation between Bret and Vijay. Suffice to say, I was not disappointed as this was a fascinating discussion that helped me understand the challenges and opportunities of security in a voice-centric world.
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Pindrop is a security company built for the voice era. The company started out by providing a fraud-detection solution used by banks and enterprise companies to identify fraud through voice biometrics. Pindrop uses 1,380 different “voice parameters” that allows for them to very accurately identify the user. The company raised $90 million back in December, which should help finance the company as it begins to set its sights on the consumer market by providing its technology to smart speaker and smart assistant providers that want to use voice biometrics for authentication and security purposes.
Here’s a quote from around the 54 minute mark as Vijay describes what Pindrop will help to facilitate, “What I would love for Pindrop to be able to do is accompany a consumer through an entire journey as voice starts taking over different parts of his life. I’d love to be able to lock my door just with my voice. I’d like to be able to drive my car and open it with my voice and then access my Salesforce data, or whatever else I need to access, with a single sign on with my voice. I’d like to go up to an airport kiosk and pull up my reservation with my voice and when I get to my hotel room, I open my room with my voice. And when I get into my room, I pull up my Netflix on the voice-activated TV, just with my voice.”
As we move into a #VoiceFirst future, a layer of security, provided by companies like Pindrop is going to be extremely important. Allowing people to securely authenticate themselves for voice purchases, controlling IoT devices remotely, approving changes to one’s account, and so forth, will make unloading a number of tasks currently handled through our mobile phones to a voice user interface that much more compelling. Imagine having a smart assistant residing in your hearable, verifying and authenticating you at all times through your voice (or physical!) biometrics. No more having to remember and type in passwords.
-Thanks for Reading-
Dave
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