Since the pandemic has set foot worldwide in 2020, cyber attacks in banks have hogged headlines across the world. Moody warned banks globally of “increased risks of cyber attacks during the continued COVID-19 pandemic”. Consistent with a VMware report, cyber attacks against banks and financial institutions globally increased 238 percent amidst the COVID-19 crisis between February 2020 and April 2020. Ransomware attacks increased during the same period. In India, the RBI red-flagged cyber security issues in its financial stability report in July 2020. In a very recent statement, the national security advisor affirmed that “financial frauds increased exponentially because of greater dependence on digital payment platforms following the COVID-19 pandemic”. In other news, global hackers made headlines as they attempted over 40,000 cyber attacks on India's banking system, amongst others, over a period of 5 days in the last week of Jan. However, cyber security incidents don't seem to be unaccustomed the banking world. The history of the primary cyber threat goes back to 1970. For many years, banks across the world are fighting countless borderless battles with faceless criminals in cyberspace. With the rapid digitisation of the industry (and other industries), cyber threats and attacks became more pervasive and complex. This has led to an increasing evolution of cyber security. Indian banks have seen a gradual rise in cyber threats as they need been exploring or embracing complex technologies (such as mobile and internet banking), improving employee intranet, and more recently, adopting hybrid cloud technology. As a result, they need been selective in adopting digitisation in the past. Before the COVID-19 crisis, a majority of the Indian banks focused on strategic digitisation of their customer services and experiences one among the four pillars of the banking ecosystem. The rapidly changing behaviour and preferences amongst rising urban customers, millennial, and therefore the middle-income population (demanding faster solutions and better customised products) drove digitisation in services to customers. On the opposite hand, usages of digital technologies amongst  three stake holders employees, business alliances, and vendors were measured and gradual. This is often partly due to the complexity of operations and also the associated degree of cyber risks. In the future, this trend of selective digitisation will change due to the evolving trends within the post COVID-19 era.

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Keywords: Cyber Crime, Banking Business, Pandemic, Threats, Transactions, Opportunities.