Consumer Driven Security

With all of the news and communication around identity theft - consumers are becoming keenly aware of the potential impacts to them. This is evidenced by the 30 plus million U.S. consumers buying a credit monitoring solution of some sort. In addition - with the new legislation, barely a day goes by when we don't hear about the latest data breach.

Consumers are concerned about security and safeguards put in place by their financial institution. Unfortunately - the average consumer really doesn't have a means in which to accurately identify if Bank A is more secure than Bank. While they can read the papers to make sure their institution has not been breached - there hasn't been a centralized report that rates institutions on their level of protection.

It appears to me that this is where we are heading. Much like we can go out to Consumer Reports and check out our next washing machine purchase, I see us being able to go out and check on our institutions security rating.

While the average consumer can go check out rates and products fairly easily, there is nothing out there in terms of how secure the institution is. Yet - if this were the case, I think there would be a monumental shift in consumer behavior. If Bank A and Bank B had similar rates and products yet Bank A had a great security rating and Bank B did not - which bank do you think the consumer would choose? This would prompt change immediately and might even provide the means for self-regulation, as opposed to more legislation.