News

Banks using unvalidated consumer data in automated decision-making, report says

April 20, 2018

A new report from Accenture finds that many banks have not invested in the capabilities to verify the validity and accuracy of their data.

According to Banking Technology Vision 2018, banks maintain a large volume of confidential data which they increasingly are supplementing with data from external, unstructured sources.

However, while 94 percent of bankers surveyed said they are confident in the integrity of the sources of their data, half are not doing enough to validate and ensure data quality, according to the report.

Of bankers polled, 11 percent trust their data is reliable, but don't validate it; 16 percent try to validate their data, but aren't sure of the quality; and 24 percent validate the data, but recognize they should do a lot more to ensure the quality.

In addition, while 84 percent of bankers said they increasingly use data to drive critical and automated decision-making, 78 percent believe that these automated systems create new risks, such as fake data, external data manipulation and inherent bias.

"Inaccurate, unverified data will make banks vulnerable to false business insights that drive bad decisions," Alan McIntyre, senior managing director and head of the banking practice at Accenture, said in the release. "Given that four in five bankers that we surveyed said they are basing their most critical systems and strategies on data, it's critical that the data can be verified and validated."

Banking Technology Vision 2018 draws on the analysis of an advisory board of more than two-dozen individuals, interviews with  industry experts, and results of a survey of nearly 800 bankers. This year's report, themed Building the Future-Ready Bank, showcases five IT trends that could generate the next wave of industry disruption for banks.