Islamic Digital Banking Framework in Malaysia: A Practitioners’ Perspective

The proliferation of the current technology has changed the operation of the banking and financial services. Financial institution in Malaysia has been urged to react to the changes in order to provide a better service to the customers as well as to the underserved people. Through the development and application of digital banking, it will help many people to access the banking services in improving their socio-economic well-being. However, the framework of Shariah compliant digital banking is necessary to be explored in order to achieve Maqasid al-Shariah or the objective of Shariah and Shariah-compliant products and services. The objective of this study is to investigate the practitioners’ perspective on the framework of Shariah compliant digital banking based on Maqasid al-Shariah for financial inclusion in Malaysia. The methodology of research in this study is qualitative approach through interview session with the practitioners. The selection of the practitioners and experts is based on their background in digital banking and Shariah. A general finding shows that, Shariah compliant digital banking should be incorporated with the element of accessibility and affordability, wealth protection and Islamic social finance in order to be in line with Maqasid al-Shariah as well as to achieve the objective of financial inclusion. This study has contributed towards the development of model for Islamic digital banking framework for financial inclusion in Malaysia.