Open Banking & PSD2 Flows
How regulated third parties access bank accounts and initiate payments on a customer's behalf — the PSD2 roles, the consent and SCA flows, the FAPI security profile, and the regional API standards (UK Open Banking, Berlin Group, STET) that implement them.
What is Open Banking?
Open Banking is the regulated practice of letting customers share their bank data and initiate payments through licensed third parties via secure APIs. In the EU/EEA it is mandated by PSD2 (the revised Payment Services Directive, in force since 2018), which forces account-holding banks (ASPSPs) to expose two capabilities to authorised third-party providers (TPPs): read access to account information, and the ability to initiate payments — both only with the customer's explicit consent and Strong Customer Authentication.
Account Information
Read balances and transaction history across a customer's accounts to power budgeting, lending decisions, accounting, and account aggregation.
Payment Initiation
Push a credit-transfer (e.g. SEPA Credit Transfer / Faster Payments) directly from the customer's bank account — an account-to-account alternative to card rails.
Funds Confirmation
A yes/no check that sufficient funds are available, used by card-based payment instruments issued by third parties.