As digital transformation picks pace, financial services organizations have a herculean task at hand – bringing new-age products and services to the market in the quickest time possible while also ensuring the required level of security and privacy. But striking the right balance between security and velocity can be an uphill battle unless there is a clear and continuous focus on DevSecOps.
The Importance of Security for Financial Services Companies
In the day and age of rampant breaches, attacks, and cyber threats, security has become a top priority for financial services organizations. Since enterprises in the financial sector deal with highly sensitive business, customer, and compliance data, they need to ensure this data is constantly safeguarded against leaks, misuse, and unauthorized access. That being said, let’s look at some of the top reasons why security is so critical for financial services companies:
Compliance
Security is a critical driver of compliance for enterprises in the financial services industry. As the financial businesses deal with transactions and investments all the time, every little piece of information must be recorded and protected at every level. Such protection is particularly vital, given the strict security, regulatory, and compliance obligations financial services companies face on a global scale.
Customer Retention
The introduction of new-age startups and FinTechs in the business landscape has made competition extremely intense for financial services organizations. While offering a range of cutting-edge products and services is crucial for customer satisfaction and business growth, security is a key requirement for and a differentiator of customer retention.
Business Reputation
Security plays a huge role in strengthening the business reputation of financial services organizations. Since customers today are quick to deflect from a business if their data is compromised and/or voice their dissatisfaction vocally, the lack of the right security measures puts a lot at stake – especially about the financial well-being of customers.
Data protection
Having the right security controls in place is also important to protect sensitive information. If private information is stolen or breached, the impact it can have on the business is hard to revert. Cybercriminals can sell this personal information on the black market or use it to plot sophisticated hacking schemes and breaches – putting customers and the business at risk.
Uptime and Availability
Security also plays a massive role in ensuring high uptime and availability of business systems. Since any downtime can lead to potential breaches of personally identifiable or financial information, around-the-clock security is critical for ensuring the underlying business infrastructure is secure.
How DevSecOps Helps in Striking the Right Balance Between Security and Velocity
The pressure on the financial services industry to protect data, safeguard reputation, and outdo the competition is constantly growing. In addition to launching new products and services quickly, the sector needs to have an array of controls and regulations in place for security purposes; any gap or loophole in these processes can lead to huge penalties for non-compliance. Since recovering from these repercussions can be difficult and can make future customers question the bank’s integrity, a series of downfalls are likely to follow.
Developed and evolved from the agile development model, DevSecOps aids in enhancing and improving the software development cycle, aiding the quick delivery of services while addressing high-quality requirements.
Many large financial institutions are now implementing the DevSecOps model to improvise their development processes and deploy quality applications at a high velocity. Let’s look at how DevSecOps helps financial services organizations strike the right balance between security and velocity:
Shifts Security Left
One of the biggest improvements DevSecOps brings to the software development life cycle is its ability to shift security left. Integrating security testing into the DNA of the product under development ensures bugs and issues are identified – and rectified – as early as possible. Such integration allows teams to carry out security testing as and when code is developed – and not after development, thus improving deployment speed and strengthening the product’s quality.
Automates Security
In addition to shifting security left, DevSecOps also enables teams to automate security testing in general. Since the cost of unplanned outages can be extremely far-reaching, DevSecOps helps in reducing downtime. Instead of relying on manual processes and traditional tools, teams can make use of modern applications to prevent infrastructure failure and achieve zero-downtime deployment – without slowing down the SDLC.
Streamlines Workflows
Financial services companies that use DevSecOps practices and tools can build a powerful foundation for digital transformation – driven by a set of standard workflows. Since the model brings in a set of common processes that can be tailored to meet specific environments, businesses can leverage these prebuilt workflows to drive speed and accuracy while freeing up teams to focus on driving innovation.
Strengthens Architecture
DevSecOps tools work around the clock to detect underlying issues and prevent infrastructure failure in enterprises. By identifying and rectifying bugs on a continuous and automated basis, the model strengthens product architecture and reduces the costs and impact of failure for financial services organizations.
Makes Security a Shared and Repeatable Process
As financial services companies look to strengthen their security posture, DevSecOps helps in making security a shared, repeatable, and adaptive process. By applying security consistently across the environment, the model ensures the business can respond to emerging requirements – even as the environment changes.
Ensures Proactive Monitoring
DevSecOps helps financial services organizations make monitoring a proactive – rather than a reactive process. Instead of forcing teams to take action after an issue or defect has been detected, it allows teams to catch bugs – long before they occur. Taking advantage of AI and machine learning techniques, DevSecOps helps streamline, simplify and speed up complex development tasks while suggesting optimal code alterations and architectural changes.
Accelerates Time-to-Market
DevSecOps also helps financial services companies enable faster updates and changes in their products and services. Since delivery and testing happens simultaneously, software teams can accelerate the delivery pipeline and enable faster velocity of new features and changes. The ability of teams to act on feedback, resolve issues, and make changes speeds up time-to-market – offering the ability to release new updates in a couple of days rather than waiting a lengthy period.
Conclusion
As financial services organizations struggle to solve the security and velocity puzzle, DevSecOps paves the way for stronger, quicker, and more robust application development. By integrating security into the cultural mindset of companies, DevSecOps helps in addressing security issues as they emerge – when they’re easier and less expensive to fix.
Implement DevSecOps today to proceed at a faster pace and back your products with the right level of security and credibility. Connect with us to learn more.
