Frequently Asked Questions

General Questions

Does Berbix have a status page?

Yes! Please find our status page here: https://status.berbix.com

What iOS/Android versions are supported by Berbix?

Please see the Supported Versions in our Docs.

Does Berbix conduct any KYC/background checks or cross-references names or ID pics against any lists?

Berbix is a powerful identity verification platform which instantly and accurately validates photo IDs, driver licenses, and passports. We do not currently conduct any background checks or validate identities across any specific PEP lists, do-not-fly lists, etc, but we may provide options to include these services in the future. Stay tuned!

What happens to the data collected in an identity verification transaction?

All user-submitted data collected during a Berbix transaction is stored securely by Berbix until either of the following occur:

you delete the Berbix transaction using the Berbix dashboard or API, or
the transaction is automatically deleted by Berbix after the duration of your retention policy

Once you manually delete the transaction or it has outlived your retention policy duration, whichever comes first, the data is permanently deleted. For example, if your retention policy is 30 days, then the user-submitted data collected for a transaction will be automatically deleted 30 days after the transaction was created.

For more information about our security practices, we encourage you to review our Privacy Policy.

What's my retention policy?

Tap "Home" in the Dashboard navigation menu and scroll to the bottom of the page. Under "Account Information," you'll see your account's retention policy.

The duration you see here may be dependent on your account's subscription type or contract. If you have questions or concerns about your retention policy, please reach out to [email protected].

What are my watermark reveal limits?

The number of images that may be revealed without watermarks is limited to help protect end users from having their data used in ways that they did not provide consent for.

Limits are set on a rolling daily and monthly basis as a percentage of transactions in that period. Unless otherwise arranged with Berbix, the default limit is set to 50%. For example, if 100 transactions are completed in a 24 hour period, up to 50 images may be revealed without watermarks.

Please note that each transaction contains multiple images, and each time an image is viewed without watermarks it is logged as an individual reveal. Accounts that reach their daily and monthly limits typically do so by revealing multiple images per transaction, or revealing single images multiple times.

If you feel that your current limits are insufficient for your needs, we’d be happy to discuss your business use case and offer suggestions for alternate workflows. If appropriate, the limit may be increased for enterprise-level accounts. To discuss, please reach out to [email protected].

Transaction Questions

Why should we provide a Customer UID when creating transactions?

Berbix generates a unique Transaction ID each time a new hosted or embedded verification flow is instantiated. This identifies the transaction, but it does not identify the individual user.

We strongly recommend that you supply a Customer UID for each individual user for two key functional benefits:

To easily locate the individual in your system or application and in Berbix
To detect and compare repeat identity verification transactions for the same individual

We also recommend the following best practices:

When creating the Customer UID in Berbix, use the same unique identifier from your internal system or application for that individual
Consider your users' security and avoid including personal information (email, name, etc.) in Customer UIDs
For optimal security, use a random character generator to create Customer UIDs
Keep in mind that Customer UIDs in Berbix can accommodate up to 64 characters and are case sensitive

Why wasn’t this transaction flagged as a duplicate?

The intention of our duplicate detection feature is to prevent users from authenticating multiple accounts using the same document.

Berbix uses the customer UID that you provide to our system as the anchor for duplicate detection.

If a user attempts two transactions using the same customer UID, the second transaction will not be considered a “duplicate”. If a user has attempted multiple transactions using the same customer UID, those attempts will all be linked at the bottom of the Transaction Report under “Other Transactions with Identical customer UID”.

If two (or more) transactions are created with different customer UIDs, and there is meaningful overlap between the information extracted from the documents in each transaction (full name, date of birth, etc.) this will be flagged as a duplicate transaction.

Please note that Berbix is only able to detect duplicates of transactions that are still within the data retention window.

Why didn’t this user complete the transaction? Was there an error on the Berbix side?

If the status of a transaction is “in progress” the transaction can be in one of several states:

(1) The user may have had to leave the flow to find their ID.
(2) The user may have decided not to provide proof of their identity. In some cases, this can be desired attrition as bad actors are less likely to provide photo IDs than well-meaning users.
(3) the user may be having technical issues stopping them from completing the verification process, such as camera permission issues.

Why does Berbix say this document has an “Incomplete” barcode? The barcode is fully visible.

Two-dimensional barcodes on the back of US and Canadian driver licenses and ID cards contain significant data, causing them to be higher-density and require more pixels. This is why we have a built-in barcode scanner across all of our user-facing SDKs.

As a result of the high-density nature of these barcodes, lower image quality barcodes may be challenging or impossible for us to decode, particularly if there is any blur, including from motion, darkness, camera quality, or print quality. Often an image of the back of an ID may appear sufficient, but is not possible to decode successfully.

Why did Berbix accept an ID that said "Not for REAL ID purposes" on it?

The REAL ID act is a set of regulations set by the U.S. Department of Homeland Security in 2005. States have spent the past 10+ years upgrading the security features on the identification documents they issue to reach the REAL ID standards.

If a drivers license or state-issued non-driver ID is not "REAL ID" certified, it does not mean that it is not a valid or legitimate document. It means that it does not comply with the specific standards necessary for entering federal facilities or boarding commercial aircraft after May 3 2023.

You can learn more here.

Configuration Questions

Do you see higher conversion when desktop users go through mobile hand-off as opposed to webcam/desktop?

Image quality is a key component of our ability to provide an automated response. Camera quality on phones is typically considerably better than image upload or webcams. This is why our product strongly encourages users to hand off to their mobile devices.