Trusting Social Philippines, a leader in AI-powered credit risk and identity solutions, and Ecofinance, a rapidly expanding fintech committed to responsible digital lending that operates under the consumer brand Honey Loan, today announced a strategic partnership to fundamentally enhance the security and accessibility of financial services for millions of Filipinos.
Through this strategic partnership, Trusting Social is deploying its proprietary AI technology to fundamentally strengthen Ecofinance’s digital security. This includes integrating the full KYC and fraud prevention stack, which features advanced AI-driven facial recognition, cross-ID verification, and real-time fraud detection, ensuring Ecofinance’s seamless customer experience is secured against sophisticated digital threats like phishing, SIM-swapping, and deepfakes.
Ecofinance supports financial inclusion by providing essential lending options to a broad customer base—a critical mission considering the World Bank’s 2025 finding that over half of Filipino adults still lack a formal financial account. However, with the Philippines facing a digital fraud rate nearly 150% higher than the global average and identity fraud surging by 121% in 2024, Ecofinance recognized that accessibility must be secured by making robust protection the ultimate competitive advantage.
“For us, inclusive lending needs to go hand in hand with secure lending. We view our partnership with Trusting Social not as compliance, but as a critical investment in protecting our customers,” said Kirill Kalashnikov, General Manager of Ecofinance Philippines. “We’re building a digital experience that ensures every customer receives not just financial freedom, but peace of mind.”
The partnership leverages Trusting Social’s unique strength as an Asian AI leader: beyond deploying its proprietary technology for security and credit scoring, the company provides extensive regional expertise honed across markets like Vietnam and Indonesia, offering valuable insights into local Filipino market behavior. This comprehensive integration is expected to deliver immediate operational benefits to Ecofinance, streamlining processes, enhancing document verification, and ultimately transforming the company into a faster, more secure, and efficient financial solution at reduced costs.
“In a market where digital trust is under attack, Trusting Social strongly echoes Ecofinance’s priority of security—it’s the only way to build sustainable inclusion,” said Johnny Escaler, CEO of Trusting Social Philippines. “Ecofinance has done the hard work of building the infrastructure to reach every Filipino. Our job is to provide the AI intelligence needed to protect that journey—to confidently verify who they are and shield them from the rising wave of digital crime. ”
This collaboration is a proactive and necessary step in a market where the rise of digital finance is shadowed by increasingly sophisticated fraud. The deployment directly addresses the urgency noted by the Bangko Sentral ng Pilipinas (BSP), aligning with mandates under the Anti-Financial Account Scamming Act (AFASA) and subsequent directives for stricter fraud management and real-time detection across the financial sector.
