Reduce Cyber Risk for Financial Services Organizations

Financial services institutions top the list when it comes to targets for cybercriminals.  Not only do they have access to trillions of dollars, but they are also responsible for storing and transmitting highly critical and valuable data. Security teams at these organizations face the difficult task of weaving in security with innovation and customer convenience, as many customers prefer to do their banking and other financial transactions online.  

Aside from worrisome cyber exposures, the financial sector is also highly regulated, so complying with multiple regulations is also a top concern. Bottom line, CISOs at financial institutions must juggle multiple priorities all while aligning cybersecurity with business goals. 

Manage Cyber Risk and Compliance in One Comprehensive Platform

FortifyData’s platform helps financial institutions manage their cyber risk and regulatory compliance programs. FortifyData enables these organizations to continuously identify assets, view and manage risks across multiple locations, perform third party risk management of vendors that serve the entire institution or only specific departments. Also, manage the applicable regulatory compliance (FFIEC, PCI DSS, GLBA, ISO 27001, GDPR, NYCRR, etc.) and questionnaire processes. FortifyData takes all this into account and can also provide a security rating for the entire financial system or specific branches.

Why Financial Institutions Choose FortifyData

  • We work with a variety of financial institutions, banks, credit unions, mortgage lenders, private equity, venture capital, payment processors and more 
  • FortifyData provides a holistic view of cyber risk across the financial institution with the ability to drill down into specific assets 
  • Prioritized view of risks with recommended remediation steps for identified vulnerabilities 
  • The accuracy of our risk assessment findings is based on continuous, direct, assessments of the financial institution’s assets, services and processes that provide an up-to-date view of cyber risk  
  • Monitor cyber risk management progress compared to other financial institutions 
  • FortifyData has been working with banks, credit unions, mortgage lenders, insurers and other financial services companies across the Nation to more accurately understand their cyber risk exposure of external, internal, cloud and third parties.  

 

Solutions for Financial Services Institutions

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Attack Surface Management and Risk-based Vulnerability Management 

Starting with asset discovery and inventory, our Attack Surface Management (ASM) identifies your financial institution’s IT assets as an attacker will. FortifyData assesses all ports and services of a financial services company’s external and internal attack surface and identifies the same vulnerabilities an attacker would. Our prioritization capabilities help you cut through the noise and get a view of the vulnerabilities with the most impact that actually matters; you can view this across the entire company or by specific branch or department. You get a prioritized risk approach that considers context through asset classification, threat likelihood, and business impact, so you know where to focus time and resources on the most critical vulnerabilities to your organization. 

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Managing Compliance, Improving Reporting and Communication 

FortifyData’s automated platform helps to streamline aspects of the compliance monitoring and reporting activities. The platform helps a financial institution to meet certain requirements of various compliance frameworks for cyber risk management, assessments, vulnerability management and third-party risk management.  

Additionally, reporting from the FortifyData platform provides easy to understand reports with underlying detail to better report and communicate compliance management with stakeholders.  

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Third-Party Cyber Risk Management 

Effectively evaluate a vendor and the specific service or product a vendor provides.

Gain visibility into third party cyber risks with continuous assessments of their external assets. We integrate our technology assessment findings to our embedded standard compliance or custom questionnaires to perform auto-validation that saves time in reviewing responses. Keep up to date on the compliance of your suppliers with your policies, and quickly identify vendors that do not comply. Get the full picture of external vulnerabilities at your third parties with our auto-validated questionnaires that leverage the live assessment data conducted on their environment. This provides you with the answers you need more quickly (in the time to run an assessment) than a manual questionnaire process. Create custom questionnaires that are specific to each vendor. Easily assign tasks and collaborate and track questionnaires with our task management capabilities. 

Speed up vendor evaluations by spending less time reviewing questionnaires with FortifyData’s Questionnaire Exchange. Participants instantly access shared validated cyber risk assessments and questionnaires, allowing you to quickly make risk based decisions.

Financial Services Cyber Risk and Compliance Frequently Asked Questions

What does FortifyData do for financial services organizations?

FortifyData is a consolidated cyber risk management platform covering attack surface management, third-party risk management, and compliance automation in one system. For financial services organizations, that means continuous, scan-verified visibility into your own security posture, your vendors’ posture, and your compliance program, rather than reconciling separate tools and separate data sets for each.

Which financial services organizations does FortifyData work with?

FortifyData works with banks, credit unions, mortgage lenders, payment processors, insurers, and private equity and venture capital firms. Each of these faces a different regulatory mix, and FortifyData’s framework coverage and vendor risk monitoring are built to reflect that rather than applying one generic approach across all financial services entities.

Does FortifyData support FFIEC and NCUA requirements?

Yes, with an important distinction: banks are examined under FFIEC guidance, while credit unions fall under a separate NCUA framework. FortifyData supports both, but they are not interchangeable regulatory regimes. For a closer look at how FortifyData supports banks specifically, see our banking page, including community banks. For credit unions, see our NCUA third-party risk management guide.

How does GLBA apply across different financial services entities?

GLBA Section 501(b) requires a documented risk assessment, but which specific rule implements it depends on the entity. Banks are supervised under the Interagency Guidelines Establishing Information Security Standards, issued by the OCC, Federal Reserve, and FDIC. Non-bank financial institutions, including many mortgage lenders, investment advisors, and payment processors, fall under the FTC’s Safeguards Rule instead. FortifyData supports building and maintaining the documented risk assessment either rule requires.

Does FortifyData support DORA and NIS2 for financial institutions with European operations?

Yes. Financial services organizations with EU operations or counterparties are increasingly in scope for DORA’s requirement to maintain a continuously monitored register of third-party ICT providers, and NIS2’s broader cybersecurity obligations. FortifyData supports both alongside US frameworks like FFIEC and NYDFS for institutions managing regulatory requirements on both sides of the Atlantic.

Is FortifyData a fit for smaller financial institutions with limited staff?

Yes. Smaller institutions, including community banks, are typically held to the same regulatory expectations as much larger organizations, often with one to three people managing risk and compliance. FortifyData is built to give a lean team the same continuous visibility a larger institution builds with a dedicated GRC staff, without the cost or complexity of enterprise platforms built for a different scale. See our community banks page for more on this specifically.

Related Resources

E-Book: Six Steps to an Effective Third-Party Cyber Risk Management Program

How to Lower Cyber Insurance Premiums

Case Study: FortifyData Uses Live Assessment Data to Improve Enterprise and Third-Party Risk Management for a Mortgage Lender