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| Banking industry leads the way on physical security of IT infrastructure |
| Tuesday, January 17, 2006 at 11:43 by Kathleen Hill |
Global Switch, one of the leading providers of purpose-built data centres, has today released results of a survey across the European banking industry on attitudes towards business continuity.
Of all sectors, banking is most likely to place the highest importance on the physical security of IT infrastructure. It is also the industry with the highest proportion of fit-for-purpose IT environments, demonstrating that banks acknowledge the need to house mission-critical IT infrastructure in purpose-built facilities.
97% of banks polled during the research, commissioned by Global Switch, stated that they were confident their mission-critical IT infrastructure was housed in a resilient, fit-for-purpose environment. Other industries asked the same question were less sure, with retailers coming in at 84% and other commercial organisations at 79%. In addition, 93% of banks allocate a specific part of their budget to prepare and maintain the physical environment in which their IT infrastructure is located, compared with only 68% of retailers. The strong results from the banking sector indicate a high awareness of the impact that high quality physical environments have on business continuity.
Julian King, commercial director of Global Switch observes,
"The banking community is to be commended for having such an enlightened view on the housing of their mission-critical infrastructure. It's clear that having IT infrastructure in a facility solely designed for that purpose can only have a positive effect on the resilience of a business, and the results of this survey indicate that the banking sector has embraced this concept wholeheartedly."
A key factor in the banking industry's attitude can be linked to the consideration of regulations such as Basel II and Sarbanes-Oxley when assessing the resilience and security of IT infrastructure. Of those polled, nearly 70% of banks admitted that this was a significant consideration compared to only 40% of retail operations and just over 50% of other commercial organisations.
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I can attest to the validity of Global Switch's findings. I work for one of the large Swiss banks, and the server rooms housing the IT infrastructure (both main, and disaster recovery) are like vaults with very strict access rules. |
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| However, the Banking industry depends on customer confidence in its security. If you ask someone whose job, and probably shareholding, depends on public perception of security, you can't be too surprised if they say they are secure, but then you can't put too much faith in it either. |
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