6 ways to drive digital stewardship in financial services in 2019
In 2019, traditional banks will need to adopt cloud services to innovate and evolve, so they can deliver highly secure products and services that give customers more control of their data. Over the next few months, we’ll explore the importance of digital stewardship in intelligent banking.
From an immersive bank to an intelligent bank
Traditional banks have long focused on a “one-product-fits-most” strategy. This is largely a matter of practicality: their legacy systems are difficult to upgrade; their business models are built on static customer segmentations, such as age, geography, and income; or, their workplaces lack the modern tools to effectively harness the talents of an ever-changing workforce. But as customer demand for more data-intensive, personalized services increases, banks that offer traditional deposit, advisory, payments, credit card, and lending services will have to evolve and transform digitally from the current “omni-channel” customer relationship approach.
To compete successfully, banks need to provide a seamless customer “omni-experience” through a single interface, that is, an end-to-end journey for each customer—from the first banking interaction to the realization of financial goals. The first step toward becoming an intelligent bank is managing and provisioning data with security and compliance top of mind.
One big theme, six blogs
Digital stewardship—the proper management of sensitive data in accordance with regulatory and security requirements—will be a big banking theme in 2019. Institutional practices and policies that don’t address responsible digital stewardship can lead to data breeches, leave fraud undetected, cause higher levels of friction during customer interactions, and disrupt the collection, maintenance, and preservation of digital assets.
My next six blogs will explore a variety of use cases to illustrate how you can use Microsoft technologies for enhanced digital stewardship in 2019 and beyond:
- Hybrid at hyperscale. The Microsoft Azure cloud platform supports scalable hybrid environments for seamless shifting between on-premises and cloud computing. Financial institutions can take advantage of a hybrid scenario to help meet industry regulations in data security but still benefit from the elasticity of cloud computing.
- Confidential computing. Enclaves, or secure hardware containers, make it possible to secure a defined subset of data, even while other data is in use. Banks choose what data resides where, so they only have to trust their own hardware and data.
- Machine learning encryption. Due to recent advances in machine learning technology, banks can now perform computations on encrypted data without decrypting the data. This means they can offload storage and computation into shared Azure environments without using decryption keys.
- Automated compliance support. Continuous innovation in Azure means the latest security and compliance updates are rolled out automatically. Banks gain advanced capabilities like blockchain, artificial intelligence (AI), Internet of Things (IoT), and API management as soon as they become available—without spending months interpreting compliance requirements.
- Operational artificial intelligence. Banks can use AI tools in Azure to monitor the operations of their consumer banking systems and networks, including payment, credit card, and lending systems. In the process, they gain customer insights and new predictive analysis capabilities.
- Microsoft investment in cloud technologies. Our commitment to digital stewardship is evident through our ongoing investment in cloud facilities and technologies that help institutions meet their compliance and security obligations.
Microsoft knows its customers in the financial services industry take digital stewardship seriously. We have dedicated teams that focus on helping financial institutions meet and exceed regulatory requirements—so they can provide their customers with the kind of personalized digital experiences they have come to expect.
Check out Azure for banking and capital markets to learn more about cloud solutions that address the biggest challenges in financial services. To stay on top of industry trends, follow me on Twitter and LinkedIn.
