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FST caught up with Agustin Abalo - SVP and CIO of Santander International - and talks security.
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FST had the pleasure of pinning down Agustin Abalo, CIO of the operation to find out it was tackling the demands of ensuring the security of its clients assets.
So, when it comes to security, can Abalo ever feel relaxed about protecting those all-important customer accounts?"We are never relaxed because in this age of information you hear about these leaks all the time, such as someone losing the addresses and account balances of 20 million clients.Obviously, that night you don't sleep because with international private banking a leakage of any sort can mean the termination of the business."Staying ahead of the bad guys is an ongoing battle for the banks, and Santander International is no different in that respect."We take as much precaution as technology and ingenuity will allow us," explains Abalo."However, we are always afraid that someone will be more ingenious than we are, but it is a battle that we are always fighting."
Internally, this private banking operation, which has European offices in Madrid, London and Geneva, has been investing heavily in voice recognition software for staff.It's a system that has proved a success , so much so that plans are in the pipeline to roll it out for the private customers.The bank's rapid growth spawned the need for a system to authenticate employees, says Abalo."As we grew, the ability to recognise our own employees when they called our helpdesk for a password reset or other types of information became more limited.When you have an organisation with 80, 90 or 100 people the helpdesk personnel usually recognise the person from the voice and look to see where the call is coming from; it's fairly easy.When you have more than 500 people distributed amongst different branch offices and, in some cases, people travelling outside the country, it becomes rather difficult."
Still today, the phone is a favoured vehicle for the fraudsters."A large percentage of technology-assisted frauds are committed by human engineering," says Abalo."By assuming that you are someone else you can get the information for that person and from there you can commit fraud.The voice authentication stops someone from getting into our system and assuming the role of one of our employees and asking for password resets, and so on."
Tools of the trade
Abalo acknowledges that although customer voice authentication is on the agenda, it is not a "tool" that will work universally with the bank's clients.
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Abalo says that security measures for staff and clients have to be different."Internally, you can subject your people to more things than your clients.Of course, the client's voice has to be registered, and we need to make sure that the person registering is the correct person in the first place."Clarity is another concern."When people call in it may be from a cell phone or a different country and this will create a different sound pattern and that, in turn, will confuse the authentication system."Abalo was reluctant to divulge when voice recognition would be rolled out for clients but said that the system was still be refined.
And while voice biometrics is one aspect of the bank's armoury, Abalo is of the opinion that bank customers are a lot more clued up nowadays about protecting their personal details from fraudsters.He also suggests that authentication is a necessary evil but one that customers accept as just part of the security process.
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As well as biometric authentication, one of Abalo's major projects has been the streamlining the bank's telecommunications between international offices in order to increase efficiency, consolidate vendors and bolster security.
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With convergence of networks comes the possibility of complications , a fact that Abalo is candid about in his response.
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One aspect of the bank's operations that Abalo has to keep a keen eye on is business continuity.
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"Our plans are to double the size of this operation within private international banking within the next three years," Abalo announces.It's a bold claim, but there is no hiding the fact that the bank is riding a crest of a wave at the moment.During the past nine years Santander International has doubled in size every three."We are a very active and aggressive institution," he adds.So will the IT infrastructure be able to cope with the forecasted growth?Abalo is sure that it will."I am confident that the core infrastructure that we have right now will be able to support operations over the strategic five-year horizon.From there on nobody knows what will happen."He does have some worries though."My concern when you are growing is being able to redefine the processes to handle a significant increased volume.We will be addressing how to do things better and more efficiently," he concludes.
AGUSTIN ABALO
Agustin Abalo is Senior Vice President and CIO, and Director of Operations for Banco Santander International in Miami.Mr. Abalo is a member and Past President of the Florida International Bankers Association, Member of the Advisory Board of the Human Resources Program at Florida International University and serves in the Board of other community service oriented non-profit organizations.
Abalo started his professional career as a systems engineer for Grumman Aircraft in Long Island, assigned to the Lunar Module Program of the Apollo Project.During his professional trajectory he has held a number of important positions including: Director of the Latin American Banking Consulting Practice for EDS; Vice President of Grupo Financiero Popular (Dominican Republic) where he also served as General Manager and Agent of the Miami Office of Banco Popular Dominicano, President of the Dominican Bank in New York and Executive Vice President of GFP Commercial Bank and Trust in Grand Cayman; Senior Manager of the Management Consulting Services Practice at Price Waterhouse in Miami; Managing Director of the Puchades Group (Spain), and Manager in Charge of the Management Consulting Unit for Coopers & Lybrand in San Juan, Puerto Rico.
He holds a Bachelor in Physics from the University of Puerto Rico and studied for his MBA at Long Island University.In addition he completed the Advance Bank Management Program at Columbia University and the International Banking Program at the University of Miami.He is a member of the Institute of Management Accountants and the Institute of Management Consultants.Abalo is recipient of several professional awards, including the 2005 Veritas Visionary Award and Grumman's Sterling Pin Award.
A recognized international expert on business continuity issues, Abalo has lectured on the subject in Europe, the United States and Latin America.In 1995 he authored a book on bank operations titled Integrated Resource Management.
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