We live in a digital world where almost everything we touch is being stored on servers, the cloud or in mobile applications. Technologists push for the adoption of digital services and applications while consumers push back for safety and fraud protection. Fintech solutions on mobile are in a predicament; on one-hand these solutions offer the premium convenience of making deposits and transfers on-the-go, and the on the other hand, it digitizes and potentially sells off a person’s most valuable possession: their wallet.
Banks and financial institutions have quite a bit to gain – especially on a global level. Although still in its early stages, the cumulative investment for FinTech in 2017 is forecast to be $150 billion.
FinTech Solutions on Mobile – Hacks Worth up to $25 Billion
“White hat” hackers (the good guys), such as security researcher Sathya Prakash, have been known to expose hacks worth up to $25 billion by taking money out of one of India’s largest banks with just a few lines of code. “I could’ve done this with anybody’s account,” Prakash told reporters at Motherboard – all he needed was an account number. While this hack had a happy ending, with a quick patch and no money lost, not all hacks do. According to Lookout, a mobile security and antivirus firm, as many as 3 percent of Android users have encountered a mobile threat in the past year [1]. This may seem like a small number, but when you consider well-known financial institutions have over 50,000 employees (and some that have over 150,000 employees like Chase or Wells Fargo), the math comes out to 1,500 to 4,500 employees who are potentially introducing risks through their mobile device operating system.
