An Information Communication Technology (ICT) expert, Mr Oluwafemi Osho has advised financial institutions to deploy integrated Information Technology (IT) security to protect their systems from cyber attacks and fraud.
Osho, a lecturer in the Department of Cyber Security Science, Federal University of Technology, Minna, gave the advice in Abuja.
According to him, some financial institutions have fairly protected systems which make them to lose money to cyber criminals.
He recalled that some students of FUT Minna recently conducted forensic examination on some mobile banking applications in the country and discovered that most of the apps stored users’ banking information on the phone.
He said that it was not meant to be so, adding that customers banking information was not supposed to be stored on mobile phones after each use.
He added that “with the research we carried out, it was obvious that security considerations were not given adequate attention in the development of such mobile banking apps.
“For financial institutions to stop losing money to fraud, they need to be cyber-resilient through implementation of effective cyber security measures.
“The measures would entail engaging more information from security experts and increase allocation of budget to security of their infrastructure.
“Financial institutions also need to integrate security in the design of their IT tools and increase the deployment of Artificial Intelligence-based tools for risk management.”
Osho observed that some financial institutions had continuously lost customers’ money to cyber fraud but bear the brunt of such occurrences.