The Institute of International Finance (IIF) and McKinsey & Co. have partnered up to survey financial institutions around the world regarding their current and planned usage of ten key emerging technologies. Our joint report explores: How are companies approaching emerging technologies? What emerging technologies are they adopting? How do they plan to secure and mitigate the associated cyber risks? What cybersecurity capabilities will be needed to successfully adopt and secure new technologies?

We find that financial services firms are embracing technologies such as cloud native infrastructure, Applied AI (including generative AI) and automation, including DevOps, to better serve their customers, innovate to offer new products and services, and optimize their business operations. While emerging technologies bring with them exponential benefits, they also bring cyber risks that financial firms must address through their cybersecurity capabilities.

As the technology landscape in the financial-services industry continues to evolve rapidly over the next three to five years and as the associated risks mount, now is the time to future-proof the environment. The report concludes with four questions that financial institutions can ask themselves about their pursuit of emerging technologies, to help lay the foundations for action.