Authorities concerned must strengthen banks financial security

Cyber security is now a major area of concern for the banking industry, with repeated hacking attempts, phishing attacks, malware attacks, OTP bypassing, and exposure of banking-related data to dark websites.

The country’s banking sector is at risk amid increasing incidents of cyber threats and hacking attempts, as most banks operating in the country do not have the resources and strategies to deal with them and lack skilled manpower and the monitoring system needed to prevent such attacks.

Due to lower investments in technology, banks in Bangladesh were at a higher risk of cyber-attacks.

According to a study in 2022 by the threat intelligence unit of the Bangladesh Government’s Computer Incident Response Team (BGD e-GOV CIRT), almost all banks have been running one or more vulnerable services and weak authentication systems, which may lead to potential cyber-attacks.

The study found that financial services were at 300-time higher risk of being the victim of cyber-attacks than other organisations.

After the $81 million reserve heist from the Bangladesh Bank account to the Federal Reserve Bank in the United States in 2016, there have been many discussions about ensuring cyber security in the banking sector.

The sector, however, has hardly made desirable progress in securing the system.

Installing the Security Operation Centre was one of the key instructions from Bangladesh Bank to secure the banking sector, as hackers were out to steal money by using malware and ransomware.

Bangladesh Bank and other financial institutions faced 31 cyber threat alerts in 2021, while the number increased to 46 the following year.

Amid the recent cyber attack threats, Bangladesh Bank shutdown some web-based services of the central bank from 8:00pm on August 14 to 8:00am on August 16.

The government agency’s cyber surveillance in 2022 discovered 3,639 bank cards on the dark web issued by different Bangladeshi banks.

Financial institutions in Bangladesh may lose up to $4,36,68,000 if these cards are found on the dark web.

Due to the fear of cyber hacking, most banks are restricting their cards and strengthening their security measures.

The government should tighten the financial regulatory system and strengthen the financial security system by involving experts.