Financial Services Focus on Security: Survey

Fear is a great motivator and after years of cutting back on various IT projects to preserve cash, leading financial services firms are now investing in identity and access management (IAM) applications in order to avoid expensive, embarrassing security lapses.

As eSecurity Planet reports, Deloitte’s latest survey of the financial services sector reveals that most have actually increased their information security budgets to stay one step ahead (or at least no more than one step behind) hackers and other cyber threats.

As the threat evolves, Deloitte said that financial services firms, driven by Governance, Risk and Compliance (GRC), have made IAM a top priority for 2010. Deloitte said 44 percent of financial services firms have made IAM their top initiative.

“Key issues, borne out by the top internal/external audit findings, are access certification, knowing who has access to information, whether it is appropriate, and documenting it—and strong governance that establishes automated, continuous processes for managing user access to information resources,” the report said.

While financial services firms across the world continue to make budget cuts, Deloitte says the knife has passed over many information security budgets, and those firms are turning their attention to Identity and Access Management.

While the world continues to struggle with the worst economic downturn in recent memory and corporate budgets suffer as a result, information security budgets at financial services firms have remained safe from the knife, according to a study by Deloitte Touche Tomatsu (DTT). In fact, the professional services firm said that many financial services firms have increased their budgets for information security.

And for the first time, Identity and Access Management (IAM) has been the top priority of many information security organizations within financial services firms, Deloitte said.

Read the full story at eSecurity Planet:


Deloitte: Financial Services Firms Prioritize IAM