IT for financial services

Macy’s Magecart breach presages Christmas fraud spike

US retailer Macy’s admits some customer data was accessed by unknown actors during a week-long Magecart attack Continue Reading

By

• Alex Scroxton, Security Editor

Azimo opens doors at Brexit-proof Dutch arm

Cross border payments fintech Azimo has opened the doors to its European headquarters in Amsterdam Continue Reading

By

• Karl Flinders, Chief reporter and senior editor EMEA

TSB programme pulled apart in report on IT meltdown

City law firm tears into TSB’s management of botched core banking platform migration Continue Reading

By

• Karl Flinders, Chief reporter and senior editor EMEA

Australian bourse to overhaul technology infrastructure

The Australian Securities Exchange is embracing digital ledger technology, microservices and DevOps to modernise its core systems Continue Reading

By

• Stuart Kennedy

Loan charge under review: The 20-year retroactive tax policy pushing IT contractors to the brink

Thousands of IT contractors are at risk of financial ruin as HMRC pursues them for tax it claims they owe on work they did up to two decades ago and were reimbursed for via loan remuneration schemes. Computer Weekly investigates Continue Reading

By

• Caroline Donnelly, Senior Editor, UK

Cyber criminals tool up for Christmas fraud season

Organised criminals are trying to cash in on the festive retail boom with both brand new and tried-and-tested techniques Continue Reading

By

• Alex Scroxton, Security Editor

Google to launch bank accounts in 2020

Google is launching bank accounts in the US in 2020 as tech giants continue to deepen their activities in the financial services sector Continue Reading

By

• Karl Flinders, Chief reporter and senior editor EMEA

Wagestream gives staff alternative to payday lenders: Fintech interview 30

Wagestream is enabling workers to access their pay in real-time, reducing the need for overdrafts and payday loans Continue Reading

By

• Karl Flinders, Chief reporter and senior editor EMEA

PCI DSS payment security compliance drops again

Worldwide, barely one-third of companies are maintaining full compliance with the PCI DSS security standard – and the numbers are falling Continue Reading

By

• Alex Scroxton, Security Editor

Major report on TSB IT disaster expected soon

A damning report into the 2018 IT disaster at TSB is expected to heavily criticise executives when it is published in November Continue Reading

By

• Karl Flinders, Chief reporter and senior editor EMEA

Goldman Sachs probed over alleged Apple Card gender discrimination

US financial services regulator is investigating allegations that Goldman Sachs’ credit decisions for its Apple Card offering show gender bias Continue Reading

By

• Karl Flinders, Chief reporter and senior editor EMEA

IBM's financial services cloud offers developer opportunity

IBM hopes to bring developers to its new financial services cloud that runs on the IBM Cloud platform and uses Red Hat OpenShift as its Kubernetes environment. Continue Reading

By

• Darryl K. Taft

GoCardless and TransferWise create global network for direct debits

Fintechs’ network will make it easier for small companies to expand their customer bases internationally Continue Reading

By

• Karl Flinders, Chief reporter and senior editor EMEA

Zopa opens testing for its banking products to customers

Zopa's move into the banking sector is gathering pace as customers test out its savings product Continue Reading

By

• Karl Flinders, Chief reporter and senior editor EMEA

Co-operative Bank extends mortgage service deal with Capita

Co-operative bank has extended a contract to outsource its mortgage platform in a deal with Capita Continue Reading

By

• Karl Flinders, Chief reporter and senior editor EMEA

Dutch banks to work together in fight against money laundering

 Continue Reading

CW Benelux: Dutch banks fight money laundering

Dutch banks are sharing expertise and resources to help reduce money laundering through their accounts. Also read in this issue how companies could lose loyal IT staff because salary rises do not match those at rival employers, and why a Dutch province is pioneering a no-code software development platform. Continue Reading

Tandem Bank embarks on international expansion

UK chanllenger bank embarks on international expansion in Hong Kong Continue Reading

By

• Karl Flinders, Chief reporter and senior editor EMEA

Abu Dhabi AI university is key to UAE’s future as the oil dries up

Abu Dhabi’s fledgling artificial intelligence university is part of a highly ambitious 30-year plan to transform the UAE’s economy and culture Continue Reading

By

• Karl Flinders, Chief reporter and senior editor EMEA

Cloud native core banking enables consumers to personalise what they buy

Google inspired core banking platform could help banks offer personalised products to millions of people. Continue Reading

By

• Karl Flinders, Chief reporter and senior editor EMEA

Nordic private equity groups drive paytech investments as global actors hover

Private equity companies in the Nordic region are stepping up M&A activity as international tech firms eye acquisitions in the region Continue Reading

By

• Gerard O’Dwyer

Goldman Sachs lends billions of dollars through Apple partnership

Apple Card issuing bank Goldman Sachs has already given billions of dollars in credit to iPhone users since Apple's credit card was launched Continue Reading

By

• Karl Flinders, Chief reporter and senior editor EMEA

The benefits of API-first software development

In this week’s Computer Weekly, we find out how organisations are using an API-based approach to software development to boost digital initiatives. We examine the potential pitfalls in using cloud storage. And we talk to the Department for Work and Pensions about its four-year project to move from outsourced IT to the cloud. Read the issue now. Continue Reading

Brits moving to digital banking channel faster than people in the US

Digital banking services rapidly gain popularity, but digital banks face major challenges to make deeper inroads into traditional banks’ customer bases Continue Reading

By

• Karl Flinders, Chief reporter and senior editor EMEA

Banks let customers down with mixed approaches to security

Treasury Committee report recommends new measures to tackle financial fraud Continue Reading

By

• Alex Scroxton, Security Editor

Nordea brings fintech for women by women

Bank’s female-only hackathon comes up with new ideas for financial services aimed at improving women’s financial wellbeing Continue Reading

By

• Jane Hamrin

TrueLayer set to expand its services through Visa network

Open banking specialist fintech will offer its APIs through payments giant Visa Continue Reading

By

• Karl Flinders, Chief reporter and senior editor EMEA

Salesforce Financial Services Cloud adds mortgage tools

Salesforce pushes deeper into financial services with tools to make mortgage data collection easier, and to find upsell opportunities for customers looking for home loans. Continue Reading

By

• Don Fluckinger, Senior News Writer

Reykjavik: An IT ecosystem beyond the ice

Iceland is a small island between Europe and the US, and that is one of several reasons why it is attracting tech startups to its capital Continue Reading

By

• Matthew Staff

IR35 reforms – the difficult decisions facing IT contractors

In this week’s Computer Weekly, we examine the difficult choices facing UK IT contractors from the controversial IR35 tax reforms. Social engineering is a major source of cyber security attacks – we look at mitigation strategies. And the IT chief at Mercedes F1 explains what it takes to support a world championship team. Read the issue now. Continue Reading

Stronger regulations needed to fix banking IT problems, say MPs

Regulators need to use more potent tools to get banks to sort out problems with their IT systems, as customers become more reliant on digital channels Continue Reading

By

• Karl Flinders, Chief reporter and senior editor EMEA

P27 pan-Nordic payments system moves a step closer

Six regional banks sign shareholders’ agreements, agree business plan and make financial commitments to payments platform Continue Reading

By

• Alex Cruickshank

Refinitiv appoints first female CTO after IT leadership shake-up

Alex Cesar steps up to be chief technology officer at financial service data provider Refinitiv, after previous CTO Phil Wellard took over as global CIO in September Continue Reading

By

• Bryan Glick, Editor in chief

Banks move to contain impact of Samsung biometric flaw

NatWest and Nationwide have moved to lock down their mobile banking apps after Samsung warned of a biometric security flaw on its Galaxy and Note S10 devices Continue Reading

By

• Alex Scroxton, Security Editor

Microsoft vs Google – who’s winning the cloud email race?

In this week’s Computer Weekly, there’s a two-horse race for dominance in the cloud email market between Microsoft and Google, but they are not alone – we examine the runners and riders. Our latest buyer’s guide looks at governance, risk and compliance solutions. And we assess the progress of public cloud in the banking sector. Read the issue now. Continue Reading

Equifax lawsuit offers more evidence against passwords

Equifax’s internal security policies were a mess and directly led to one of the largest recorded data breaches in history, according to a lawsuit, demonstrating fundamental insecurities inherent in the use of passwords Continue Reading

By

• Alex Scroxton, Security Editor

Two-thirds of UK financial services firms are using machine learning

The use of machine learning in the finance sector is set to increase as obstacles to its take up are not seen as being insurmountable Continue Reading

By

• Karl Flinders, Chief reporter and senior editor EMEA

Huge rise in rogue banking apps driving fraud attacks

Fraud perpetrated through fake mobile apps purporting to be from legitimate banks has seen a statistically significant spike, says RSA Continue Reading

By

• Alex Scroxton, Security Editor

Barclays demonstrates proof-of-concept quantum clearing algorithm

Barclays and IBM researchers publish paper on a quantum computing algorithm for securities transaction trading Continue Reading

By

• Cliff Saran, Managing Editor

The demise of Lehman Brothers sparked Inbotiqa’s flame: Fintech interview 29

Following its demise former IT workers at Lehman Brothers used the experience they gained at the bank to create a tech start up Continue Reading

By

• Karl Flinders, Chief reporter and senior editor EMEA

IR35 private sector preparation: What the banks’ take on the reforms means for IT contractors

With six months until IR35 tax avoidance reforms are extended to the private sector, a number of financial services firms are thinning out their contractor workforce – is that the way to ensure compliance? Continue Reading

By

• Caroline Donnelly, Senior Editor, UK

Zopa continues in its mission to apply a Netflix user experience to banking

Zopa has made a credit scoring tool available as it continues to expand the portfolio of products it offers beyond loans. Continue Reading

By

• Karl Flinders, Chief reporter and senior editor EMEA

Digital and innovation apprentices to start NatWest programme

NatWest is kicking off a tech apprentice programme, with its digital innovation hub set to play a key role Continue Reading

By

• Karl Flinders, Chief reporter and senior editor EMEA

French and German banks end talks on challenger bank sale

After months of negotiations, BPCE's proposed sale of Fidor Bank to OLB has fallen through Continue Reading

By

• Karl Flinders, Chief reporter and senior editor EMEA

Why would a bank that made billions of pounds’ profit cut thousands of staff?

HSBC is the latest bank to make thousands of staff cuts as even profitable businesses need to reshape themselves for the challenges that digital transformation brings Continue Reading

By

• Karl Flinders, Chief reporter and senior editor EMEA

GoCardless gives 95% of its staff business intelligence at their fingertips

Fintech payments company GoCardless is enabling staff to carry out business intelligence queries themselves Continue Reading

By

• Karl Flinders, Chief reporter and senior editor EMEA

CW Middle East: Saudi banks trial biometrics in ATMs

Biometric and blockchain technologies are being used in tandem to provide ID verification at Saudi Arabian cash machines. Also read about the first government organisation in Bahrain to migrate to Amazon Web Services, and an interview with Yasmeen Al Sharaf, head of fintech and innovation unit, Central Bank of Bahrain. Continue Reading

Interview: Yasmeen Al Sharaf, head of fintech and innovation unit, Central Bank of Bahrain

 Continue Reading

Saudi banks trial blockchain-based identity technology at ATMs

 Continue Reading

Sweden’s SEB explores core banking in the cloud

Swedish Bank is the latest organisation to agree to start using a Google-inspired, cloud-native core banking platform Continue Reading

By

• Karl Flinders, Chief reporter and senior editor EMEA

Deutsche Bank to set up innovation division to drive digital transformation

More details about Deutsche Bank’s new technology division in internal company email Continue Reading

By

• Karl Flinders, Chief reporter and senior editor EMEA

UKtech50 2019 – help us find the most influential people in UK technology

Computer Weekly’s annual search for the 50 most influential people in UK technology reaches its 10th anniversary – let us know who you would like to nominate for this year’s list Continue Reading

By

• Bryan Glick, Editor in chief

NatWest bank uses artificial intelligence to predict the future

NatWest is using artificial intelligence to help it paint a more accurate picture of future trends Continue Reading

By

• Karl Flinders, Chief reporter and senior editor EMEA

IR35 reforms: Lloyds Bank contractors to get deadline on future employment status

Lloyds Banking Group is the latest large firm set to end engagement of IT contractors through personal service companies due to impending IR35 tax reforms Continue Reading

By

• Caroline Donnelly, Senior Editor, UK

From university lab to mainstream Mambu provides cloud ERP system for banks: Fintech interview 28

Mambu started as a university project and is today offering cloud based banking services across the world. Continue Reading

By

• Karl Flinders, Chief reporter and senior editor EMEA

IR35 reforms will prompt Barclays to re-engage contractors on PAYE terms, 'leaked email' suggests

Barclays is understood to have notified line managers via email on 30 September 2019 of its plans to phase out use of limited company contractors, ahead of the IR35 private sector reforms coming into force in April 2020 Continue Reading

By

• Caroline Donnelly, Senior Editor, UK

Interview: James Smith, director of digital, Nationwide Building Society

James Smith says heading up the digital unit at Nationwide Building Society is the best job in the business Continue Reading

By

• Karl Flinders, Chief reporter and senior editor EMEA

ABN Amro investigation lends weight to anti-money laundering collaboration by Dutch banks

Dutch authorities are investigating ABN Amro for possible failures to monitor and report potential money laundering activity Continue Reading

By

• Karl Flinders, Chief reporter and senior editor EMEA

SIBOS audience applauds Boris Johnson’s loss in the Supreme Court

SIBOS audience welcomes UK governments defeat in Supreme Court with a round of applause Continue Reading

By

• Karl Flinders, Chief reporter and senior editor EMEA

Nordic payment collaboration will ease cross-border payments

P27 and Mastercard to bring seamless cross-border payments across Norway, Finland, Denmark and Sweden Continue Reading

By

• Alex Cruickshank

Enterprises can hire software robots at the push of a button

IPsoft is beta testing a marketplace where businesses can look at what software robots are available and interview them about their suitability to take roles Continue Reading

By

• Karl Flinders, Chief reporter and senior editor EMEA

EBA outsourcing guidelines: What banks, fintechs and cloud providers need to know

The regulatory landscape for financial services and outsourcing will undergo a refresh this month with new guidance from the European Banking Authority. We look at what banks, fintechs and cloud firms need to do Continue Reading

By

• Caroline Donnelly, Senior Editor, UK

CTO interview: Paul Clark, Tandem Bank

Tandem Bank’s chief technology officer had a close encounter with legacy banking when he left his previous job to pursue a career in fintech Continue Reading

By

• Karl Flinders, Chief reporter and senior editor EMEA

Direct Line built an insurtech it can tweak a thousand times a day

Insurance group Direct Line has added a new business to its portfolio, designed to let it act as a sandbox for its digital journey Continue Reading

By

• Karl Flinders, Chief reporter and senior editor EMEA

Emotet phishing botnet returns from summer vacation

The Emotet phishing trojan-turned-botnet is back in action after a three-and-a-half month break, say threat researchers Continue Reading

By

• Alex Scroxton, Security Editor

Fintech Bud cuts 20% of workforce

Fintech Bud is cutting support staff as it focuses on engineering open banking software capabilities Continue Reading

By

• Karl Flinders, Chief reporter and senior editor EMEA

Travelex launches fintech platform for B2B customers

Travelex has launched a digital platform that enables businesses to use its services via application programming interfaces Continue Reading

By

• Karl Flinders, Chief reporter and senior editor EMEA

The five software testing techniques every software developer should know about

Five simple testing techniques that will help developers test their software systematically, thoroughly and quickly Continue Reading

By

• Brian Hambling

Ecuador citizens’ data breach holds lessons for enterprises

What caused the mass breach of Ecuadorian citizens’ data, and what can businesses learn from it? Continue Reading

By

• Alex Scroxton, Security Editor

Podcast: The Computer Weekly Downtime Upload – Episode 30

The Computer Weekly Downtime Upload podcast team returns from its brief summer hiatus to discuss HPE’s hardware refresh processes, the financial services industry’s changing relationship with cloud and a charity that is helping people with chronic illnesses find work in tech Continue Reading

By

• Brian McKenna, Senior Analyst, Business Applications
• Clare McDonald, Business Editor
• Caroline Donnelly, Senior Editor, UK

PSD2 security deadline extension is not a reason for further can kicking

The extension of a compliance deadline for PSD2 should not be a signal for banks to reduce preperations Continue Reading

By

• Karl Flinders, Chief reporter and senior editor EMEA

Gartner Catalyst: Prepare for web giants crushing your industry

Companies like Amazon and Alibaba are taking a bigger chunk of the customer journey, but they are also spreading across industry sectors Continue Reading

By

• Cliff Saran, Managing Editor

Ditch hoodies and hackers to encourage diverse security recruitment

The cyber security industry needs to address a systemic image problem if it is to succeed in recruiting more diverse teams Continue Reading

By

• Alex Scroxton, Security Editor

When AIs go to war: Autonomous cyber weapons ‘inevitable’

CISOs must start thinking about how to engage with intelligent, adaptive, non-human attackers, says Trend Micro’s Rik Ferguson Continue Reading

By

• Alex Scroxton, Security Editor

Dutch banks to work together in fight against money laundering

Dutch banks are sharing expertise and resources to help reduce money laundering through their accounts Continue Reading

By

• Karl Flinders, Chief reporter and senior editor EMEA

Fintech lender increases loan limit as customer demand accelerates

Small business lender Esme Loans has increased its loan limit to quarter of a million pounds as businesses are drawn to its simple and fast digital platform Continue Reading

By

• Karl Flinders, Chief reporter and senior editor EMEA

Industry opposition to no-deal Brexit hardens, says TechUK

A survey of TechUK members has found that 71% believe a no-deal Brexit at the end of October will negatively affect them in spite of their preparations Continue Reading

By

• Alex Scroxton, Security Editor

Less than quarter of fintechs prepared for no-deal Brexit

A survey reveals that less than a quarter of UK fintech companies have their businesses prepared for the UK's exit from the EU Continue Reading

By

• Karl Flinders, Chief reporter and senior editor EMEA

Mirai descendants dominate IoT threat environment

Attacks leveraging compromised IoT devices are growing in size, scale and frequency, report security experts at F-Secure and Trend Micro, with Mirai-related botnets a major source of trouble Continue Reading

By

• Alex Scroxton, Security Editor

Bloomberg will move historic trading data to cloud in support of clients’ machine-learning ambitions

Bloomberg’s CIO for enterprise, Tony McManus, says its clients’ changing attitude to using cloud is changing the way the firm makes its real-time trading data available to the financial services community Continue Reading

By

• Caroline Donnelly, Senior Editor, UK

Fintech Fluidly combines Google’s cloud and AI tech to ease SME cashflow management woes

London-based fintech Fluidly explains how its recent all-in move to the Google Cloud is supporting its continued growth, and delivers new features to customers faster Continue Reading

By

• Caroline Donnelly, Senior Editor, UK

GDPR non-compliance worse than feared

Over half of UK businesses do not yet appear to be fully GDPR-compliant, and many have de-prioritised their compliance efforts Continue Reading

By

• Alex Scroxton, Security Editor

Brexit disrupts FCA exploration into data use in wholesale banking

The extra work for banks due to Brexit preparations has caused a delay to FCA work on the use of data in the wholesale banking sector Continue Reading

By

• Karl Flinders, Chief reporter and senior editor EMEA

Inside NatWest Ventures

NatWest Ventures is helping NatWest bank to remain relevant to its SME businesses customer community through digital innovation Continue Reading

By

• Karl Flinders, Chief reporter and senior editor EMEA

BT gears up to take on rogue drones

BT’s Enterprise unit is offering customers an anti-drone security solution to protect their physical sites from intrusion Continue Reading

By

• Alex Scroxton, Security Editor

Social engineering a factor in virtually all cyber attacks, report claims

Almost every single cyber attack will, at some stage, require a human to be tricked into doing something, according to research by Proofpoint Continue Reading

By

• Alex Scroxton, Security Editor

Loyal Dutch IT professionals not being rewarded enough, survey shows

Companies warned they could lose loyal IT staff because salary rises do not match those on offer from rival employers Continue Reading

By

• Kim Loohuis

Tandem Bank steps up its artificial intelligence training with appointment

Tandem Bank names seasoned artificial intelligence expert to drive its journey to personalise banking Continue Reading

By

• Karl Flinders, Chief reporter and senior editor EMEA

Businesses need to keep investing in tech and hope to avoid a no-deal Brexit

A no-deal Brexit could have serious consequences for the UK tech sector and skills base, making it more difficult to recruit technology specialists and hire freelancers Continue Reading

By

• Albert Ellis, Harvey Nash Group

Danish MobilePay app moves away from mainframe

Danske Bank’s popular mobile payment app moves from mainframe to open source DataStax Enterprise built on Apache Cassandra Continue Reading

By

• Alex Cruickshank

Nationwide Building Society harnesses low-code platform

Software development platform makes it quicker to build apps Continue Reading

By

• Karl Flinders, Chief reporter and senior editor EMEA

CISOs think cloud safer, but security fears remain

The majority of information security leaders think cloud is now safer than on-premise, but security fears remain, with recently breached and highly regulated organisations most concerned, poll reveals Continue Reading

By

• Warwick Ashford, Senior analyst

Allied Irish Banks selects cloud platform for digital transformation

Bank is streamlining its operations through a cloud platform from nCino Continue Reading

By

• Karl Flinders, Chief reporter and senior editor EMEA

Security Think Tank: Risk mitigation is key to blockchain becoming mainstream

What are the best and most effective ways information security professionals can use blockchain technology? Continue Reading

By

• Mike Yeomans, Information Security Forum

UK organisations join quantum comms pilot

Four UK companies are taking part in a pilot project to build the most secure communication infrastructure in Europe Continue Reading

By

• Warwick Ashford, Senior analyst

TSB works with Silicon Valley tech firm to help SME customers take card payments

UK bank will offer its small business customers card-processing and point-of-sale technology by partnering with a fintech set up by Twitter CEO Continue Reading

By

• Karl Flinders, Chief reporter and senior editor EMEA

Security Think Tank: Blockchain – balance risk and opportunity for smart security

What are the best and most effective ways information security professionals can use blockchain technology? Continue Reading

By

• RV Raghu, ISACA

CIO interview: Simon McNamara, chief administrative officer, RBS Group

Brought in after a catastrophic IT failure that affected 6.5 million customers, the IT chief at Royal Bank of Scotland Group says the bank is now a leader in innovation. Continue Reading

UK gets first millionaire ethical hacker

Six months after the first millionaire ethical hacker was announced, five more have been recognised, including a Briton, who have collectively discovered nearly 5,000 vulnerabilities Continue Reading

By

• Warwick Ashford, Senior analyst

Don’t upset the Apple Card

Apple has reiterated its searing contempt for the hoi polloi that uses its products by releasing a physical credit card you’re not supposed to put in your wallet. The titanium card is, in Apple’s ... Continue Reading

By

• Ryan Priest