In recent years, the demand for cybersecurity products and services has increased across industries. This article will help you to get answers to questions like why cyber security is a career, skills required to become an expert in cyber security and top jobs in cyber security.
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What is Cyber Security in Banking?
Cyber security refers to the organization of technologies, procedures, and methods designed to prevent networks, devices, programs, and data from attack, damage, malware, viruses, hacking, data thefts or unauthorized access.
The main objective of Cyber security in banking is to safeguard the user’s assets. As individuals go cashless, further actions or transactions are done online. Individuals use their digital money like debit cards and credit cards for transactions that require to be safeguarded under Cyber security.
Importance of Cyber Security in Banking Sectors
Cyber security is not only restricted to IT organisations, it is important for every single business. But, for banks, it holds important value. Banks deal in millions of transactions on a regular basis. Hence, it is very important for banks to take protective security procedures to safeguard their data against cyber attacks. Here are some reasons why cyber security is essential for banks.
Loss to Customers
When a bank confronts a cyber attack, it not only affects the bank’s status but also causes loss to its customer’s assets. Normally, when a user loses money due to card fraud, it can be retrieved from the bank. But, in circumstances like data infringement, it takes time to retrieve the funds, which is very worrying for customers. To keep customer’s data safe, every bank needs to execute cyber security methods that can safeguard their customers’ data.
Bank’s Reputation
Data infringement is a crucial problem for banks, as it leads to losing users data. If the customers’ data of a bank is breached, then it becomes hard for customers to have confidence in the bank. Data breaches generally happen because of weak cyber security approaches.
Thus, it is required to have cyber security necessities for banks to evaluate the current security measures and protect crucial data.
Digitization
As we know, nearly everything has been digitized now. From ordering products to making meetings and sending money, we trust on various digital platforms. This makes it highly important for banks to advance their banking functions utilized by customers, as hackers can swiftly access banking apps if proper cyber security methods are not applied.
Cases of Attack in Cyber Security in Banking
As the world goes digital, Cyber attackers have found different ways to attack and steal data.
- Banks have seen unrelenting attacks from organized criminals and hackers. It was seen in a recent case with Canara Bank where a cyber attacker attacked and vandalized the bank’s website by adding a malicious page and blocked bank’s e-payments.
- Another case of an attack in cyber security in the banking sector in India took place with Union Bank of India where they faced a huge loss. The hackers gained access using fake RBI employee ID and one of the bank’s employees fell prey to the phishing email and clicked on a malicious link which led to the malware manipulating the system.
Top Cyber Security Threats Faced by Banks
Over the last couple of years, cybercrimes have become very prevalent in the financial sector that it is now believed one of the industry’s greatest risks. Hackers have advanced in technology improving their skills, making it very challenging for any banking sector to stop the threat each time. Here are some cyber security threats faced by banks:
Phishing
Phishing means to get confidential, classified data such as credit, debit card details etc. for malicious actions by hiding as a reliable person in electronic interaction. Online banking phishing scams have advanced constantly. They seem real and genuine, but they trick you into providing away your access data.
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Malware
End to end customer appliances like computers and mobile devices are largely used for performing digital transactions therefore, they should be secured. If it is associated with malware, then it may cause a severe risk to the bank’s cyber security whenever they link up with your network. Confidential data goes through this network, and if the user device has malware fitted in it, with no security that malware can create a serious danger to the bank’s network.
Unencrypted Data
It is one of the most frequent threats encountered by the banks where the data is left unencrypted, and cyber attackers or hackers manipulate the data right away, thus creating serious issues for the banks. All information that is kept on computers in banks or online should be fully encrypted. It will guarantee that even if the data is robbed, hackers may not be able to utilize them.
Spoofing
This is one of the latest forms of cyber threats faced by financial institutions. The hackers will pose as a bank website’s URL with a website that is related to the original one and works the same way and when the customer enters his or her login records that login credentials are robbed by these hackers and they use it later.
Data Manipulation
A widespread misunderstanding about cyber attacks is that they are only worried about data stealing. This is not always the case, however, as data manipulation attacks have gradually become a more common means of attack for hackers. Data manipulation attacks take place when a dangerous actor gains entry to an objective system and creates unnoticed changes to data for their own individual gain. An example of this is if a worker modifies customer information data. This will likely go undetected as the transactions will appear genuine, leading to errors in how future data is stored. The longer the manipulation goes unnoticed, the more destruction it will cause.
How to Make Banking Institution Cyber Secure
The main goal of Cyber security in banking is to safeguard the customer’s data and assets. As more and more people are going cashless, more and more banking transactions are done online.Here are some ways to make banking institutions cyber secure:
Combined Security
As BFSI is highly structured, banks put in time, money, and work in utilizing the finest technology which might be sometimes hard to handle altogether. Moving towards united security where all elements work and connect is more advantageous.
Multi-factor authentication
Multi-factor authentication (MFA) is a verification technique in which access is only given once a customer gives two or more login credentials. Login credentials can consist of passwords, opts, or fingerprints. When establishing MFA, make sure that login credentials do not come from a similar resource (two passwords) as this will diminish security. MFA is a need for banks as it includes an extra layer of security when trying to access important information.
Cyber insurance
Cyber insurance makes sure that an organization is economically secure in the event of a cyberattack, making it an essential element of a cyber security plan. Along with containing legal costs, cyber insurance haulers also inform customers of infringements so that organizations are in agreement with data breach regulations. Furthermore, cyber insurance will also help to pay to fix damaged systems and rebuild the data.
Consumer Awareness
It is one of the key aspects where the user has to be made aware of not revealing their user credentials to anyone. They should testify to the cyber security cell in case of any questionable developments in their operations or in their bank account as quickly as possible.
Antivirus and Anti-malware Applications
A firewall will improve protection, but it will not prevent attack unless revised anti-virus and anti-malware products are utilized. Renewing to the latest application can prevent potentially devastating attacks on your system.
Cyber Security Jobs in Banking Sector
Here are various jobs in cyber security in the banking sector
The chief information security officer (CISO) is an official accountable for a company’s information and records security. In the past the position has been barely defined along those lines, these days the title is often used interchangeably with CSO and VP of security, showing a more extensive position in the company. He is responsible for security operations, cyber risk and cyber intelligence and security architecture.
Security Architecture
Security architecture merges hardware and software experience with coding expertise, research skills, and strategy development. Security architects predict potential risks and create systems to pre-empt them. Security architect responsibilities needed strong communication and administrative leadership skills. Often tasked with top teams of information technology specialists, security architects may convey and distribute computer security policies and methods across a company.
Network Security Engineer
Network security engineers are mainly responsible for retaining a private network’s security by designing, creating, enhancing, and checking network systems. They constantly troubleshoot methods to enhance network productivity and protect data from bugs and infringements. Their job serves to supervise existing risks and to get rid of these risks.
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Top Cyber Security Framework For Banks
Cyber security is a concern for every organisation. And particularly for banks who hold a lot of personal data and transaction lists, it is very essential for banks to have the necessary cyber security solutions and procedures in place.
Many governing bodies like RBI in India, FFIEC in U.S., monetary authority of Singapore (MAS), etc. have made it necessary for banks to obey some detailed guidelines and created banking cyber security standards to help them in uncovering the gaps in the present system.
NIST Cyber Security Framework:
The National Institute of Standards and Technology (NIST) is a measurement guidelines laboratory and a non-regulatory organization of the United States Department of Commerce with the objective of the increasing invention and business competitiveness.
The NIST Framework provides a common language and method for organizations to:
- define existing cyber security posture;
- define their focus state for cyber security
- recognize and focus on opportunities for progress within the framework of risk management
FFIEC stands for Federal Financial Institutions Examination Council. FFIEC has taken various programs to improve the knowledge of the cyber security risks and wants to detect, evaluate, and lessen these threats among financial organizations and their crucial third-party service providers.
Conclusion
Cyber security in banking is something that cannot be negotiated with. With the progress in digitalization in the financial industry, it has become more inclined to hackers. Hence, there needs to be foolproof cyber security that doesn’t negotiate with the security of user’s and bank’s data and money.