Avoid Rebuilding your SWIFT Connectivity via the Cloud

Businesses and banks all around the world have started a modernization journey to reimagine their systems and prepare for the future. Despite the different problems that each institution encounters, they all strive for the same outcomes: new and improved channel experiences, integrated new technologies, cost management, and cost takeout, improved risk management and security, less downtime, and operational efficiency. These objectives are intended to lay the groundwork for expansion, adaptability, and, eventually, a better customer experience, facilitated by SWIFT Connectivity for global financial transactions.

Most banks and businesses have declared a cloud adoption strategy to help in this trip. They realize that switching to a cloud model for its increased flexibility, agility, resilience, and time-to-market is essential to the success of their transformation efforts. The time has come to pause and consider all of your options as the race to adopt the cloud increases. Can you securely communicate with other networks and partners in the ecosystem? Can you automate to reduce the risk of noncompliance? Do you build your systems with zero trust in mind? Are your internal resources geared toward high-value work or are they being overworked by escalating operational demands?

The adoption of clouds has gone mainstream. Executives in every business are investing in and demanding that their physical infrastructure be relocated to the cloud due to its demonstrated advantages, putting pressure on their teams to achieve mass migration to the cloud while losing sight of their actual goals. Companies typically “lift and shift” their systems, resolving the same problems in a different setting while only getting the bragging rights of a “cloud infrastructure.”

Should your SWIFT connectivity be rebuilt on a public cloud?

The basic fundamental network for domestic and international financial communications is provided by SWIFT, one of the important parts of the banking and payments infrastructure. It serves as the foundation for the world economy. Maintaining SWIFT Connectivity access is essential, and any unplanned outage or removal from the network would have serious negative economic effects. In recent times, SWIFT has expanded access to its 11,000 member bank and corporate network with public cloud connectivity provided they abide by the application installation and configuration rules and SWIFT Customer Security Program (CSP) requirements. To establish and maintain communication, SWIFT hardware components must continue to be deployed on-site or in colocation facilities.

What do you stand to gain from “rebuild your SWIFT connectivity ‘as-is’ on a public cloud”? Your infrastructure still has to be constructed and configured. You are still in charge of applying upgrades and maintaining the infrastructure. You still need to take care of your physical footprint. You still have to develop or maintain the capabilities and assets necessary to sustain a SWIFT infrastructure, as well as the accountability to adhere to legal requirements. This is not better, faster, or less expensive. Instead, think about switching from a “construct and maintain” paradigm to a “subscribe and accelerate” strategy that incorporates a SWIFT-certified service bureau that adds value and a cloud that is specifically designed for financial services.

Imagine a scenario in which your SWIFT infrastructure is housed on a public cloud that has been specially created to comply with financial services regulations, and is completely maintained and managed by a team of SWIFT professionals that you can rely upon at any time. You might join a global network of completely redundant SWIFT gateways, ensuring connectivity availability while completely removing the effort of managing it. Does it seem too good to be true? This is feasible, but it calls for a partner with the comprehensive capabilities and in-depth knowledge needed to handle the challenge’s complexity.

What are your main concerns if you move your SWIFT infrastructure to the cloud? Everything comes down to this: “What value am I hoping to get out of this initiative? ”

To host hardware components, a SWIFT Connectivity infrastructure must have a physical footprint. You need to maintain some components on-site or install them in a new colocation facility as a result of cloud migration will probably increase operational complexity. Utilizing managed services will significantly lower cost and risk, at least for important infrastructure components.

You are still in charge of deploying, configuring, integrating, maintaining, and updating your infrastructure, even though hyperscalers offer accelerators and tools to help construct the infrastructure. You must acquire and keep highly valued abilities and resources to accomplish this. You may take advantage of a pool of specialist resources that are accessible on demand by finding the proper partner that can handle your SWIFT infrastructure. You will receive assistance from these resources while you deploy and run your system. Additionally, this team will support you in future efforts to implement additional SWIFT capabilities (GPI features, APIs, other messaging options, etc.) or to comply with mandates by making recommendations for improvements.

Finally, since compliance with SWIFT Customer Security Program (CSP) rules is required, you have options and flexibility to reduce the quantity and complexity of in-scope components thanks to SWIFT’s architecture models. Your annual assessment can be made simpler by utilizing API interfaces or outsourcing particular components to a SWIFT Certified Service Bureau. This will let you hand off a lot of the responsibility to your partner.

You should be able to go above and beyond the SWIFT requirements by choosing the correct cloud provider. When a cloud is created for the financial services sector, it takes into account the complex operational, technical, regulatory, and cyber concerns that are specific to that sector. The requirements for operational efficiency, cyber resilience, and operational resiliency can only be fully satisfied by a cloud that handles these risks.

A cloud provider must collaborate with top financial institutions and industry regulatory partners to create and establish a security controls framework to keep on top of the complex rules governing the financial services industry’s adoption of the cloud. Then, to secure the most sensitive financial data, it must fully integrate these controls into its IaaS and PaaS services and provide market-leading security capabilities and best-in-class encryptions. Such a financial services-specific cloud is intended to speed up the transfer of the most sensitive workloads in a highly regulated sector while lowering the risk, expense, and time needed for such transformation.

Your SWIFT infrastructure migration to the cloud could seem like a challenging project to take on. Fortunately, there is no requirement for an all-or-nothing strategy. A planned and organized approach can result in significant advantages.

Consider the solutions that will help you handle your largest problems with the least amount of investment: You can easily transfer your DR while maintaining your production settings. You can contact your connectivity and gateways while keeping your message interface in-house. You can keep your infrastructure the way it is while also deploying a third redundancy site on the cloud. You have a lot of choices to think about that will provide value without a significant cloud move.

The proper partner can assist you in not just evaluating your options but also in considering and putting into use the ideal operating model, technology, and skill set required to achieve results in this dynamic environment.

Here at CourseMonster, we know how hard it may be to find the right time and funds for training. We provide effective training programs that enable you to select the training option that best meets the demands of your company.

For more information, please get in touch with one of our course advisers today or contact us at training@coursemonster.com