After the revised Payment Services Directive (PSD2) was launched, the environment for two types of service providers was created. Only authorized service providers are allowed to use open banking API. Institutions should be registered as account information service providers (AISP) or payment initiation service providers (PISP). Also, it is possible to classify both AISP and PISP.
So what is AISP and is it beneficial? It is possible to guess from its name that using AISP allows you to read, collect and compare personal financial data from various banks and financial platforms. It gives a view of overall and specific account situations, but using AISP doesn‘t allow you to make a transaction or initiate any other action.
Main differences between PISP. This service provider has permission from a bank or other financial institution to make a transaction or take any other action. This feature is adaptable and is beneficial in many cases from payments management to saving purposes or loans. It is hard to compare PISP and AISP because each service provider uses these technologies for different purposes. The application range is very wide.
The strong side of AISP platforms is analytics tools and the possibility of comparing different services, finding the one which fits the needs best. There are different reasons why companies want to provide account information using AISP. That depends on what it is created for and what benefits could be offered to a user. Customers can compare their indicators with big data. Some of the platforms use artificial intelligence systems to provide useful insights for users.
Is my private information freely accessible to everyone? How can I be sure that my personal information is safe? No need to worry about it. No one else except you has the possibility of getting and analyzing your personal information. When you start using the AISP service, at first you need to set up the connection and verify authentication.
Who regulates AISP? As mentioned before, it is based on PSD2. Each information provider meets requirements and gets authorization approval. Some details depend on the country and the national law, but in general, similar rules apply globally.
If you need a platform that helps to manage your existing accounts or choose and compare different services, this system must be using AISP. PSD2 opened a unique opportunity and regulated this sphere so users can better manage their personal or company funds.