New SailPoint research highlights need for stronger identity security in financial services

Identity-related breaches are growing in financial services: 93% of respondents report experiencing a breach within the past two years

AUSTIN, TX – March 8, 2023 – SailPoint Technologies, Inc., a leader in enterprise identity security, today released “The state of identity security 2023: A spotlight on financial services,” a comprehensive report highlighting the increased need for strong identity security in the financial service industry. The report found that while a growing number of financial services firms are prioritizing identity security, attacks remain dangerously commonplace, with 93% of respondents reporting that they have experienced a breach within the past two years.

The report includes a number of encouraging findings, including 100% of respondents indicating that identity security is either a relatively important, critical, or number one investment priority within the organization. Furthermore, 56% of those surveyed indicated that their organization has fully implemented an identity security program, with 29% stating that their program has been in place for at least two years. These numbers reflect the growing prioritization of identity security across the financial services sector.

The report also highlights the various identity security challenges financial services organizations face. Among respondents, 91% indicated that they have experienced challenges when it comes to adopting identity security, with the most common being flexibility in integration (38%), high configurability (35%), or being complicated to implement (32%). In addition, nearly all respondents (97%) agreed that their organization’s ability to detect and prevent identity-related security breaches needs improvement. Despite those challenges, 100% of respondents reported experiencing benefits from their identity security solution, including the ability to connect the identity program to horizontal applications (49%), cost and/or time savings within the IT and security teams (45%), and more control and visibility into users (44%).

“The financial services industry deals with large amounts of sensitive data and personal identifiable information, making it a prime target for attackers,” said Matt Mills, President of Worldwide Field Operations for SailPoint. “This makes strong identity security a necessity. The fact that over half of the surveyed financial services firms have fully implemented an identity security solution is a step in the right direction, but it’s clear that there is still room for improvement. Breaches have long been a fact of life in the financial sector, but implementing a strong identity security solution greatly reduces the potential damage that an attack can incur.”

To read the “State of identity security 2023: A spotlight on financial services” report in its entirety, click here. To take a maturity assessment to see how far along your organization is in its identity security journey, visit the SailPoint website.

Methodology
The insights in this report are based on a survey of 150 IT and IT security decision makers conducted in August and September 2022. Respondents were located across the US, UK, Canada, Australia, Brazil, France, Germany, and Japan and were from organizations with 1,000 or more employees.

# # #

About SailPoint
SailPoint is a leading provider of identity security for the modern enterprise. Enterprise security starts and ends with identities and their access, yet the ability to manage and secure identities today has moved well beyond human capacity. Using a foundation of artificial intelligence and machine learning, the SailPoint Identity Security Platform delivers the right level of access to the right identities and resources at the right time—matching the scale, velocity, and environmental needs of today’s cloud-oriented enterprise. Our intelligent, autonomous, and integrated solutions put identity security at the core of digital business operations, enabling even the most complex organizations across the globe to build a security foundation capable of defending against today’s most pressing threats.

Media Relations for SailPoint
Samantha Person
Senior Manager, PR & Corporate Communications
(512) 923-4053
[email protected]