JJ Hornblass
Hi, everyone. I’m JJ Hornblass and welcome to The Buzz from Bank Automation News where we chart the future of banking automation technology. This is our Weekly Wrap for what’s happening in the industry on March 26 2021. Already, thanks to bank automation news, advertisers, MX, Vena Solutions and NVIDIA for their support. So thank you to them. And I am pleased to be joined by Loraine Lawson and Jaspreet Kalra from the Bank Automation News editorial team. Hello to both of you and welcome. Welcome everyone. First to Gen tech news. It is still early days but one forecast suggests that adoption is adoption of AI in venture capital decisioning is about to pick up on AI is expected to be involved in 75% of venture capital investment decisions by 2025. And that’s up from less than 5%. Today and according to a Gartner forecast so relevant to our bank automation news community. KFC owner yum brands is buying Israel based startup Tictuk technologies. I hope I said that correctly. That helps customers order food to go via text. The technology turns around a customer’s order in as fast as 60 seconds. I am sure KFC eaters will be happy about that. Digital banking service Greenwood, which was founded by Killer Mike, who I think is a rapper, but I’m not quite sure, but I am not quite sure to help. And this was founded to help black and Latino individuals and business owners raised $40 million in a series A also in venture funding notarize, which lets users sign and notarize official documents digitally raised 130 million in a series D to hit a valuation of 760 million. And it says its revenue group 600%. Since March of 2022, banking automation technology news our general theme today is why API went by API’s are so needed in automation. And what triggers it what triggered this discussion? Is the news that UiPath has purchased cloud elements. Loraine, maybe you could kick us off. Tell us a little bit about this purchase. And what it says about API usage within banking automation.Loraine Lawson
Well, API’s are important because they allow connections integrations to be more secure, stable and perform better than say going through a user interface, which is what RPA is typically do. And it’s API integration has been a weak spot for API RPA providers in the past, which became painfully clear if you were using an RPA to automate, say, for instance, payroll Protection Program applications. So base that used RPA found themselves completely shut out by the Small Business Administration, which just shut down the bots. And part of that is, you know, the bots are just duplicating what a human would do. So if a human’s going to, for instance, email the application in it’s just going to overwhelm the servers by having 1000s of bots doing this like having 1000s of people doing it versus an API, which is so think about if you’re at a table and if everybody in the restaurant goes up to the counter to order their own food versus having a waitress who takes everybody’s order, puts them in order and then brings them to the chef right so one is very organized, the other can get very chaotic. And this is basically what happened during the Small Business administration’s first PPP rounds, so they shut down bots, people who use bots to automate were shut out versus the APS who were able to continue to submit their applications. So that’s why this is a huge play for you and path it gives them I think over 200 new native integrations, which means they’ll be able to do more sophisticated automation use cases.JJ Hornblass
So this deal was announced this week. And wood wood and this kind of goes to we could open this to Both of you, I mean, their API’s and been a part of the automation technology setup for a while. But what kind of new API’s are necessary? Or why is why does UI path need need to acquire our cloud elements, which is a provider of API solution?Loraine Lawson
Why API’s have been around a while, but they’re kind of a specialty, right? So integration companies typically use them. For PPP they’ve been or for RPA, they’ve been focused on producing robots, and they just haven’t developed that tech technology as much. So it’s, it’s less a matter of them having the technology and more matter than them having more of the technology. So the more API’s, the more you’re able to integrate with different enterprise solutions, and even outside your organization, if that makes sense.JJ Hornblass
jaspreet How does this extend to other facets of financial technology?Jaspreet Kalra
I mean, the way I sort of looked at it is that if you’re thinking about connecting data, you need different types, and API’s one of the most prominent sort of pipes to do that, and which is why you’re seeing a lot of traction among companies towards this approach. Because no matter who you talk to engineer Street, there is one line that comes out pretty clearly, which is data is the oil of this industry, you need access to that oil, to be able to create good value products. And that’s why I think API’s and when API’s meet our peers, that becomes a sort of extended connection within that information pipeline. And the way it connects to sort of, you know, how how other sectors in the vertical are looking at it using something like regulation tech, which is now increasingly accommodating things like RPA, things like AI. So a new study by Juniper research came out last week talked about how, by implementing AI infused technology that checks regulation, and compliance, banks could end up saving over 100 $460 million over the next quarter over the course of the next five years. So you’re really seeing these well standardized data, which has a rule switch tasks are being implemented using technologies like RPA, and especially AI infused options.JJ Hornblass
Are there are there limits to this? Is there you know, like, what, how does how do the API’s need to be built as we kind of move more into an AI driven overall technology environment for financial institutions?Unknown Speaker
Right, do you want to take?Loraine Lawson
Yeah, I can answer a little bit about that. So if you’ve ever so think about going back to before API is basically what you had was ETL, extract, transform and load, it was a complicated process involving a lot of lines of code. If you’ve ever looked at an API, they’re actually around 10 to 20 lines of code. They’re very short pieces of code. And so they’re very effective at what they do. So I don’t know how they need to change to evolve for AI. But the point is, they’re very simple, simple pieces of code for developers to use. So I think, I think it makes a lot of sense to use AI and and to couple that with API so that the data can go through very quickly, versus the sort of the alternatives, which is older technologies.JJ Hornblass
Is it is it the connections that cloud elements? had that really attracted UI path? Or because if you’re saying that the the the technology is actually kind of simple, it’s actually not that much code? Is it just meaning those? I think you said it was something like 200 or so connection? Is that the real driver for UI path to be able to generate, you know, high return office acquisition?Loraine Lawson
Well, you have to remember, it’s code that’s that’s coordinated between different software. So you have to make sure it works with say SAP and Oracle. And so there is, you know, an expertise in in developing them, just because it’s short doesn’t mean it doesn’t take expertise. So they’re buying, you know, the fact that this is already done for them, is how I see it now. I haven’t did I talk to you? It would be interesting to ask them more questions. But what I’ve been told by IDC n was sorry, the name escapes me now award didn’t is that this is a big play for them and will enable them to do even more sophisticated automation. So sort of moving from a tactical just bot approach to a more strategic approach that’s allowing you to reach across more enterprise applications.JJ Hornblass
jaspreet maybe we can touch a little bit on on Kind of another development in the industry, which is the revelation of the extent to which there are cyber threats in within credit unions and and the automated solutions that are necessary to resolve those maybe a little bit of background on that would be helpful.

Jaspreet Kalra
Sure. Yeah. I mean, so what really triggered that report was this study by cybersecurity serving information and analytics from lactide, which talked about how very commonplace mistakes can expose credit unions to a lot of risk, say something as simple as a leaked credential. So just to get some background on this, the dark web is a fascinating place that many of us will never visit. And some of us that do understand that it’s beautifully complicated, but you can also find things that you would not find anywhere else. So I was speaking with the chief information security officer at blackhat. And what he told me is that they’ve been noticing a lot of data dumps, coming out, which contain these credentials that employees or credit unions might be using to log in. Or even if it’s not an employee, if it’s a vendor that the credit union uses, say, for marketing, or for mobile payments, if those vendors have security flaws, that network effect of the internet really extends into real liability or real wonder ability for these credit unions. So I think what’s going to be very center stage going forward is how do you monitor for threats. And I think automation really brings in that point where you continuously monitor for threats instead of reacting to a threat when it occurs. So those things are going to be pretty important. And another thing that I found worth noting was that a lot of these websites that are not have just recently gone digital or like going digital very strongly. Now, they using some sometimes they end up using forms that do not limit the number of attempted requests you can meet so that you could keep logging in, keep logging in, keep logging in. And the study found about 70% of credit union websites had at least one login form where a bot could be deployed to continuously make attempts and crash the website. So how Lorraine was talking about the number of bots actually forced the Small Business Administration to shut them down here, when an attacker uses those bots to do things again, and again, you run into problems as well. So I think as things get more and more sophisticated, more and more sophisticated solutions will be necessary to fight against them.

JJ Hornblass
Is there something about credit unions that make them more vulnerable? Or what about that community kind of seems to amplify the

Jaspreet Kalra
I think there’s a couple of factors there. But the pandemic itself, people turn towards local banking mode that you you started banking at your local organization, and they also went digital. So it’s like a two way factor there at the same time. And like any attacker, like any sort of adversary hackers also look for weak links, and the weakest link sometimes happen when your growth is going up, your assets under management have gone up, but cybersecurity hasn’t been invested in. So you’re still running the systems that you were, say running five years ago, and a small one, that ability like a software patch, or like an employee using the same login and password for their Instagram profile and for their bank profile, could end up being a major risk point. I mean, we all know the infamous password, so logins 123, which came into the headlines recently, but then again, I think it’s all about basic cyber hygiene and threat monitoring that any organization does. And big banks are able to do it better because they sort of invest more.

Loraine Lawson
If I could just say credit unions aren’t the only ones outsourcing their security. We had news this week that progress bake, and American Riviera Bay, we’re both smaller banks or have outsourced their cybersecurity to SBI, which is a regulated company that manages and administrates hedge private equity mutual funds and pooled or separately managed assets. So that may be a trend that we were seeing here to outsource security so that you can automate security.

JJ Hornblass
So that’s something that I will be looking at going forward. Lorraine jesperi. What else do we have planned for our RV?

Loraine Lawson
Hello. Oh, sorry. Next week, we have five questions with ally finances Chief Information data and digital officer. And we’ll also be taking a look at why process mining is a critical step for automation.

JJ Hornblass
Just breathe. Oh, is that Oh, do you? Yeah. So

Jaspreet Kalra
for the next week. So far, I’ve been reporting on what’s what is happening in the mortgage automation vertical. So we’ll have that story on and also been looking into how personal savings algorithms are being used by users and whether they’re a useful tool that is being enabled by AI right in our smartphones for all

Loraine Lawson
we need to know that.

JJ Hornblass
All right, well Thank you so much to both you and thank you everyone for joining us on this episode of the buzz. We’re looking forward to seeing you next time. Please visit us at Bank automation news.com for more coverage of the market, and also follow us on Twitter and LinkedIn. Please don’t hesitate to rate the podcast on your podcast platform of choice.

JJ Hornblass
Hi, everyone. I’m JJ Hornblass and welcome to The Buzz from Bank Automation News where we chart the future of banking automation technology. This is our Weekly Wrap for what’s happening in the industry on March 26 2021. Already, thanks to bank automation news, advertisers, MX, Vena Solutions and NVIDIA for their support. So thank you to them. And I am pleased to be joined by Loraine Lawson and Jaspreet Kalra from the Bank Automation News editorial team. Hello to both of you and welcome. Welcome everyone. First to Gen tech news. It is still early days but one forecast suggests that adoption is adoption of AI in venture capital decisioning is about to pick up on AI is expected to be involved in 75% of venture capital investment decisions by 2025. And that’s up from less than 5%. Today and according to a Gartner forecast so relevant to our bank automation news community. KFC owner yum brands is buying Israel based startup Tictuk technologies. I hope I said that correctly. That helps customers order food to go via text. The technology turns around a customer’s order in as fast as 60 seconds. I am sure KFC eaters will be happy about that. Digital banking service Greenwood, which was founded by Killer Mike, who I think is a rapper, but I’m not quite sure, but I am not quite sure to help. And this was founded to help black and Latino individuals and business owners raised $40 million in a series A also in venture funding notarize, which lets users sign and notarize official documents digitally raised 130 million in a series D to hit a valuation of 760 million. And it says its revenue group 600%. Since March of 2022, banking automation technology news our general theme today is why API went by API’s are so needed in automation. And what triggers it what triggered this discussion? Is the news that UiPath has purchased cloud elements. Loraine, maybe you could kick us off. Tell us a little bit about this purchase. And what it says about API usage within banking automation.Loraine Lawson
Well, API’s are important because they allow connections integrations to be more secure, stable and perform better than say going through a user interface, which is what RPA is typically do. And it’s API integration has been a weak spot for API RPA providers in the past, which became painfully clear if you were using an RPA to automate, say, for instance, payroll Protection Program applications. So base that used RPA found themselves completely shut out by the Small Business Administration, which just shut down the bots. And part of that is, you know, the bots are just duplicating what a human would do. So if a human’s going to, for instance, email the application in it’s just going to overwhelm the servers by having 1000s of bots doing this like having 1000s of people doing it versus an API, which is so think about if you’re at a table and if everybody in the restaurant goes up to the counter to order their own food versus having a waitress who takes everybody’s order, puts them in order and then brings them to the chef right so one is very organized, the other can get very chaotic. And this is basically what happened during the Small Business administration’s first PPP rounds, so they shut down bots, people who use bots to automate were shut out versus the APS who were able to continue to submit their applications. So that’s why this is a huge play for you and path it gives them I think over 200 new native integrations, which means they’ll be able to do more sophisticated automation use cases.JJ Hornblass
So this deal was announced this week. And wood wood and this kind of goes to we could open this to Both of you, I mean, their API’s and been a part of the automation technology setup for a while. But what kind of new API’s are necessary? Or why is why does UI path need need to acquire our cloud elements, which is a provider of API solution?Loraine Lawson
Why API’s have been around a while, but they’re kind of a specialty, right? So integration companies typically use them. For PPP they’ve been or for RPA, they’ve been focused on producing robots, and they just haven’t developed that tech technology as much. So it’s, it’s less a matter of them having the technology and more matter than them having more of the technology. So the more API’s, the more you’re able to integrate with different enterprise solutions, and even outside your organization, if that makes sense.JJ Hornblass
jaspreet How does this extend to other facets of financial technology?Jaspreet Kalra
I mean, the way I sort of looked at it is that if you’re thinking about connecting data, you need different types, and API’s one of the most prominent sort of pipes to do that, and which is why you’re seeing a lot of traction among companies towards this approach. Because no matter who you talk to engineer Street, there is one line that comes out pretty clearly, which is data is the oil of this industry, you need access to that oil, to be able to create good value products. And that’s why I think API’s and when API’s meet our peers, that becomes a sort of extended connection within that information pipeline. And the way it connects to sort of, you know, how how other sectors in the vertical are looking at it using something like regulation tech, which is now increasingly accommodating things like RPA, things like AI. So a new study by Juniper research came out last week talked about how, by implementing AI infused technology that checks regulation, and compliance, banks could end up saving over 100 $460 million over the next quarter over the course of the next five years. So you’re really seeing these well standardized data, which has a rule switch tasks are being implemented using technologies like RPA, and especially AI infused options.JJ Hornblass
Are there are there limits to this? Is there you know, like, what, how does how do the API’s need to be built as we kind of move more into an AI driven overall technology environment for financial institutions?Unknown Speaker
Right, do you want to take?Loraine Lawson
Yeah, I can answer a little bit about that. So if you’ve ever so think about going back to before API is basically what you had was ETL, extract, transform and load, it was a complicated process involving a lot of lines of code. If you’ve ever looked at an API, they’re actually around 10 to 20 lines of code. They’re very short pieces of code. And so they’re very effective at what they do. So I don’t know how they need to change to evolve for AI. But the point is, they’re very simple, simple pieces of code for developers to use. So I think, I think it makes a lot of sense to use AI and and to couple that with API so that the data can go through very quickly, versus the sort of the alternatives, which is older technologies.JJ Hornblass
Is it is it the connections that cloud elements? had that really attracted UI path? Or because if you’re saying that the the the technology is actually kind of simple, it’s actually not that much code? Is it just meaning those? I think you said it was something like 200 or so connection? Is that the real driver for UI path to be able to generate, you know, high return office acquisition?Loraine Lawson
Well, you have to remember, it’s code that’s that’s coordinated between different software. So you have to make sure it works with say SAP and Oracle. And so there is, you know, an expertise in in developing them, just because it’s short doesn’t mean it doesn’t take expertise. So they’re buying, you know, the fact that this is already done for them, is how I see it now. I haven’t did I talk to you? It would be interesting to ask them more questions. But what I’ve been told by IDC n was sorry, the name escapes me now award didn’t is that this is a big play for them and will enable them to do even more sophisticated automation. So sort of moving from a tactical just bot approach to a more strategic approach that’s allowing you to reach across more enterprise applications.JJ Hornblass
jaspreet maybe we can touch a little bit on on Kind of another development in the industry, which is the revelation of the extent to which there are cyber threats in within credit unions and and the automated solutions that are necessary to resolve those maybe a little bit of background on that would be helpful.

Jaspreet Kalra
Sure. Yeah. I mean, so what really triggered that report was this study by cybersecurity serving information and analytics from lactide, which talked about how very commonplace mistakes can expose credit unions to a lot of risk, say something as simple as a leaked credential. So just to get some background on this, the dark web is a fascinating place that many of us will never visit. And some of us that do understand that it’s beautifully complicated, but you can also find things that you would not find anywhere else. So I was speaking with the chief information security officer at blackhat. And what he told me is that they’ve been noticing a lot of data dumps, coming out, which contain these credentials that employees or credit unions might be using to log in. Or even if it’s not an employee, if it’s a vendor that the credit union uses, say, for marketing, or for mobile payments, if those vendors have security flaws, that network effect of the internet really extends into real liability or real wonder ability for these credit unions. So I think what’s going to be very center stage going forward is how do you monitor for threats. And I think automation really brings in that point where you continuously monitor for threats instead of reacting to a threat when it occurs. So those things are going to be pretty important. And another thing that I found worth noting was that a lot of these websites that are not have just recently gone digital or like going digital very strongly. Now, they using some sometimes they end up using forms that do not limit the number of attempted requests you can meet so that you could keep logging in, keep logging in, keep logging in. And the study found about 70% of credit union websites had at least one login form where a bot could be deployed to continuously make attempts and crash the website. So how Lorraine was talking about the number of bots actually forced the Small Business Administration to shut them down here, when an attacker uses those bots to do things again, and again, you run into problems as well. So I think as things get more and more sophisticated, more and more sophisticated solutions will be necessary to fight against them.

JJ Hornblass
Is there something about credit unions that make them more vulnerable? Or what about that community kind of seems to amplify the

Jaspreet Kalra
I think there’s a couple of factors there. But the pandemic itself, people turn towards local banking mode that you you started banking at your local organization, and they also went digital. So it’s like a two way factor there at the same time. And like any attacker, like any sort of adversary hackers also look for weak links, and the weakest link sometimes happen when your growth is going up, your assets under management have gone up, but cybersecurity hasn’t been invested in. So you’re still running the systems that you were, say running five years ago, and a small one, that ability like a software patch, or like an employee using the same login and password for their Instagram profile and for their bank profile, could end up being a major risk point. I mean, we all know the infamous password, so logins 123, which came into the headlines recently, but then again, I think it’s all about basic cyber hygiene and threat monitoring that any organization does. And big banks are able to do it better because they sort of invest more.

Loraine Lawson
If I could just say credit unions aren’t the only ones outsourcing their security. We had news this week that progress bake, and American Riviera Bay, we’re both smaller banks or have outsourced their cybersecurity to SBI, which is a regulated company that manages and administrates hedge private equity mutual funds and pooled or separately managed assets. So that may be a trend that we were seeing here to outsource security so that you can automate security.

JJ Hornblass
So that’s something that I will be looking at going forward. Lorraine jesperi. What else do we have planned for our RV?

Loraine Lawson
Hello. Oh, sorry. Next week, we have five questions with ally finances Chief Information data and digital officer. And we’ll also be taking a look at why process mining is a critical step for automation.

JJ Hornblass
Just breathe. Oh, is that Oh, do you? Yeah. So

Jaspreet Kalra
for the next week. So far, I’ve been reporting on what’s what is happening in the mortgage automation vertical. So we’ll have that story on and also been looking into how personal savings algorithms are being used by users and whether they’re a useful tool that is being enabled by AI right in our smartphones for all

Loraine Lawson
we need to know that.

JJ Hornblass
All right, well Thank you so much to both you and thank you everyone for joining us on this episode of the buzz. We’re looking forward to seeing you next time. Please visit us at Bank automation news.com for more coverage of the market, and also follow us on Twitter and LinkedIn. Please don’t hesitate to rate the podcast on your podcast platform of choice.