The future of regulation is unfolding in your unstructured data

Posted by Kristina King 21.05.21

When you picture the future of finance, what do you see?

The end of notes and coins? The adoption of cryptocurrencies and a further decline of high street banking? And what about data-driven regulation?

Our CEO Simon Cole recently authored an article for Finance Derivative sharing his insights for how the future of regulation is unfolding in your unstructured data. Here is an overview of what he talked about.

What does the future of regulation look like?

Advances in technology impact us all, and that includes the regulators too. As we see the future of financial services unfold, we also see the future of financial regulations adapting in response. Financial services have been embracing digital adoption during the pandemic which has added to the amount of data being created. With data on the rise, regulators have had to create their own data-driven approach to keep up.

How does this impact organisations? With an influx of newly created information, regulators need to see organisations actively applying intelligent data management strategies to the growing amount of sensitive data they hold. Much of that data is unstructured, and without stringent management, organisations can be at risk of that data being stolen or corrupted.

By implementing new IT infrastructure, organisations can manage and mitigate risks through effective data management and governance frameworks. The good news is that most firms already have the information they need to deal with the future of regulation.  All they need to do is take control of their unstructured data.

Understanding the push towards data-driven operations

Since the global pandemic, financial services have moved towards cloud-native architecture in response to global lockdown and the surge in remote working. With this, customers required the digitisation of traditional services, in turn generating large amounts of new data. Not only that, but with the current backlog of unstructured data that organisations must deal with, the requirement for unstructured data management has never been greater.

In recent years, the ways in which the financial industry is using data has changed, and this is also evident in the way regulators, such as the FCA, are managing their data too. hivera recently hosted the Data and Compliance Summit, during which the FCA’s Steve Green discussed how the body is exploring how it handles granular data so that organisations no longer need to aggregate.

Now is the time for financial services organisations to take control of their data and focus on how to manage and analyse the sea of unstructured data which has been created. In 2020, financial organisations embraced technology to operate remotely and digitise for their customers, and now is the time to embrace technology to take control of their unstructured data.

A new environment

It is accepted that new tech creates new risks, but for many organisations who are new to using cloud technology these risks, such as human error, are unavoidable.

Organisations are becoming more agile and adapting to changes as they happen; however, this leaves the potential for regulatory compliance to be compromised and for security operations to no longer be fool-proof.

Organisations need to implement data management strategies and solutions that can keep up with the new pace in the way data is created. Cyber-security incidents are rife, with a 50% increase of reported incidents in the beginning of 2020. As organisations adjusted to new ways of working, hackers were then able to capitalise on this transition.

The regulators require firms to provide information on their protocols and strategies for mitigating these risks. The transition to remote working and digitisation of services is unlikely to change. This means organisations need to be vigilant and have full oversight of their data estates to protect this sensitive data.

To prepare for the future of regulation, financial services need to start acting now.

Interested in finding out more about the future of regulation and how it is unfolding?

Interested in reading the full article published on the Finance Derivatives? Here’s the full version of The Future Regulation is Unfolding In Your Unstructured Data.

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