Cyber security has become a growing concern for banks and financial institutions nowadays to protect data from unauthorized alterations and access. Cyber security has become a primary challenge to avoid huge financial losses. This is the reason cybercrime is receiving a huge amount of attention. Cyber security has become a major issue to national security in India. Most of the financial institutions and banks rely on technology for their operations. Sensitive data of banks can be at risk without proper cyber security measures taking place. It is important for banks and other financial institutions to know how cyber criminals operate and what are the latest security threats. Indian banking sector is highly vulnerable to cyber threats as they don’t have any security technology that is considered reliable against the latest threats. However, building up cyber security in banks is not a one-time effort. Instead, it is an ongoing process. It is important to monitor the systems constantly through surveillance and identify common loopholes in security measures of financial transactions. It is important to constantly update and upgrade hardware and software to address the vulnerabilities in old versions. The banking sector in India has been through several major changes in its functioning and structure since 1991 when India has witnessed liberalization in its true form. India has welcomed a lot of foreign multinationals to enter its market and raised the competition significantly. Many customer-oriented strategies have come into practice. The rising dependence on information technology has also brought cyber security risks, especially in the banking industry. Reserve Bank of India (RBI) had sent a circular to all the Indian banks’ CEOs named “Cyber Security Framework in Banks”, stating that the banks should urgently place a robust resilience/cyber security framework for complete preparedness against online threats. On the other hand, the NIST cybersecurity framework provides a computer security guideline for private organizations to improve their preparedness to prevent, detect, and avoid cyber-attacks.  This framework is used by many countries like Israel and Japan and has been translated to several foreign languages. In this study, we are going to compare NIST and RBI cyber security frameworks. In addition, we will understand common cyber security threats to e-banking in India and how RBI can help prevent them.

Keywords: RBI Framework, NIST Framework, Cyber Security, Cyber Threats, Financial Institutions.