Visa has agreed to buy BioCatch in a $2.4bn all-cash deal that signals how seriously the payments giant is taking the surge in AI-enabled financial crime.
The company is being purchased from funds advised by Permira alongside other shareholders. By folding BioCatch into its existing cyber, fraud, risk and security offering, Visa aims to give clients stronger defences against account takeovers, scams, money mules and application fraud, threats that are growing rapidly in scale.
BioCatch’s technology draws on AI and machine learning to examine thousands of signals spanning applications, behaviour, devices and networks, from typing patterns and touch gestures to how a phone is held, in order to separate genuine customers from criminals as activity happens.
Its reach is substantial: the firm safeguards 1.8 billion devices and 760 million users globally, and counts over 350 banking clients across 21 countries, among them more than 100 of the world’s biggest banks.
For Visa, the deal extends a broader push to intercept threats before they reach the payment stage. The firm has channelled upwards of $13bn into technology and infrastructure over the past five years to protect the payments ecosystem and drive fraud rates down.
Its wider security portfolio includes the Visa Vulnerability Agentic Harness, an open-source AI tool built to help clients find and fix vulnerabilities at scale. With BioCatch on board, Visa’s AI-powered protection will span the full journey from account opening through to transactions.
Visa president of value-added services Andrew Torre said, “Account takeovers and scams cost the global economy over $1 trillion annually and AI is enabling these attacks at unprecedented scale. BioCatch will help our clients stop fraud before it reaches the point of payment. This acquisition is part of our strategy to help clients prevent cyber threats upstream while continuing to protect transactions as they occur, building trust into every transaction.”
BioCatch CEO Gadi Mazor said, “Real-time insights into customer intent continue to grow increasingly essential for institutions to establish trust within digital banking sessions. For more than a decade, we’ve demonstrated behavior’s unique ability to distinguish the criminal from the legitimate.
“In the last couple of years, we’ve shown how real-time intelligence-sharing networks between our customers can amplify the power of our behavioral intelligence further still. Together with Visa, we’re even better positioned to advance our mission of making the world a safer place to transact and protect consumers from financial crime.”
Stay ahead of the threats and deals shaping the industry. Join FinTech leaders who rely on FinTech Global for early insight and strategic intelligence and subscribe to the FinTech Global newsletter today.
Copyright © 2026 FinTech Global
