Technical Hurdle
On Sept. 1, the Financial Supervisory Service (FSS) announced that due to Google's decision to discontinue its support for Plug-in Application Programming Interface (NPAPI) on Chrome in Sept., it is possible that electronic financial transactions via Chrome will not go smoothly.
NPAPI is a cross-platform plugin architecture used for e-commerce and Internet banking on Chrome. Google decided to end its support for NPAPI plug-ins with Chrome version 42, owing to crashes and security vulnerabilities.
As a result, financial authorities are working to prepare for the disappearance of NPAPI on Chrome, together with financial companies. There are 16 banks and 10 security firms that provide online services like the transfer of money through Chrome. Kookmin Bank started its service on the same day and six banks – Shinhan Bank, Hana Bank, Korea Exchange Bank, Busan Bank, and Woori Bank – two security firms – Mirae Asset Securities and Shinhan Investment Corp – and two credit card companies – Hyundai Card and BC Card – plan to introduce the service during this month. The FSS is planning to finalize its measure in order to make it possible to use financial services provided by other banks and securities firms on Chrome version 42 and higher within the year.
However, an official at the FSS said, "If NPAPI is not supported, people are required to use previous Chrome versions or Internet Explorer for e-commerce and Internet banking." Financial authorities are planning to provide support for the next-gen web standard, Hypertext Markup Language 5 (HTML5), and to actively encourage the introduction of new identity verification and security technologies through cooperation between relevant government agencies and related organizations.