By Carolyn Crandall

The days of Jesse James’s train and bank robberies and John Dillinger kicking down doors with his trademark Tommy gun may be long gone, but bank heists are alive and well in the 21^st century — albeit with a new flair. Instead of dramatic physical robberies, today’s criminals have shifted the battleground to cybersecurity, infiltrating the networks of financial institutions globally to steal money and personal information. The attacks remain staggering. Back in 2012, individuals and businesses are believed to have lost approximately $78 million during Operation High Roller. Fast forward to today, and the hacking group known as Bandidos Revolution Team is reported to have stolen hundreds of millions of pesos by infiltrating interbank payment systems and hacking into ATMs. Notably, this group is not believed to be connected to another, separate 300-million-peso heist from five banks last year.

By Maria Allen

The string of hacks that continue to make headlines around the world underscore a universal truth, especially in the financial services industry: Trust is everything. And as consumer concerns rise, the onus is squarely on financial institutions to secure customer data.

An overview of distributed ledgers and some benefits and risks of using them.

By Katherine West

Distributed ledger technology, sometimes referred to as DLT, is a relatively new technology that is quickly becoming a hot topic due to its association with cryptocurrencies like Bitcoin. But what exactly is it? Though often associated with cryptocurrencies, DLT is, at its core, a new form of record keeping that can be applied in a wide variety of settings.

By Philippe Benitez

Biometric technologies are here to stay. That much is evident, thanks to consumers’ avid adoption of mobile devices and everyday applications that leverage fingerprint identification, facial recognition and other modalities that already extend into the mobile banking realm. As that tech diffuses into other parts of daily life and business, including airports, automobiles and commerce, it’s worth considering how it might transform bank branches, one of the last bastions left relatively untouched by the digital revolution.

According to a recent Assessment of Business Cyber Risk report, released by the U.D. Chamber of Commerce and FICO, the level of cyber risk to the U.S. business community held steady for the first quarter of 2019, with a national risk score of 687.