The Customer:

A leading bank with large-scale operations in the Middle East.

The Challenge:

The bank is among the top-ten banks in the Middle East. It offers a wide range of consumer and commercial banking products and services like checking, savings, commercial and retail credits, bank assurance products, credit cards, trade finance and foreign exchange to about 50,000 customers who mostly utilize retail banking services. Regulatory authorities have advised banks to seek a comprehensive external audit at least once in 3 years in their overall IT infrastructure, including the security aspects. As a progressive bank, the bank wished to have in place security policy and processes to conduct the audit at shorter intervals.

Recommended Solution:

i-flex consultants used a combination of interviews/discussions with the bank's officials and documentation and reports. Recommendations were made on the following:

	security framework and procedures
	gaps in security procedures
	system security policy to address gaps

Customer Benefits:

Major benefits accrued from i-flex's consultative approach of total identification of security loopholes were:

	a critical evaluation of the current security level at the main computer center and other branches
	a listing of potential threats as perceived by the consultants on all domains, namely desktop, server, network, and intranet. These could be internal as well as external threats
	risk assessment based on the identified threats
	recommendations for reducing the vulnerabilities and the risks associated with the threats
	design of an optimal security policy based on a review of the bank's current security policy and additional inputs from the outcome of the assessment exercise