Bank'd5
Gmail for your FI?
Heath S. asked 3 months ago
I’d say most banks just use Exchange for e-mail…but would you use GMail for your FI? Is it worth the fight with examiners if you can prove to them that it may actually be safer by Google hosting your e-mail than your FI. Think about it…Google’s security controls are more strict than 90% of banks out there.
David A.
In the past you needed to host as much technology your bank needed to SAVE money. This has grown into a culture so to speak, the more servers you have the better off you are. Thinking outside the box, outsourcing risk, removing overhead and cost is what CTO are asked to do today. There is a company called LIFE LOCK that is helping us see that we can think outside the box and provide a product that is far better than it was years ago. If your bank exceeded all compliant needs and recommendations and you are saving the bank money, you will find common ground. If g-mail for business can achieve your goals and provide a safe environment for your customers data, it should not be a fight. I am sure banks would love to outsource risk for a better product that would affect the bottom line in a positve way.
Mike T.
I love using GAFYD to handle all of my personal email and am curious as to whether or not businesses will catch on.
If a few places go through the process and make something like this happen it will open the door to a lot of new opportunities. However, its going to take that first FI being the guinea pig before others follow, I imagine.
Tony M.
I feel like odd man out here. I think that all emails need to remain under the CUs domain. In fact I find it to be in critically bad taste when a CU has a yahoo or hotmail or ISP email address. It is a little hard to trust a cu who cant affordthe $10 it costs to register a domain and the $10 a month to host your emails off site. Normally you should never transmit confidential information via email anyway (no email is really secure).
Not being “inside” of the credit union structure myself and speaking strictly from a branding and technology background I think using “Free” email services smacks of unprofessional. I would never do business with that CU. It would freak me out.
Sorry guys :(
That being said, I use almost all ofthe google apps including gmail – just not as my primary business email address.
Mike T.
@Tony: I think you’ve misunderstood what we’re saying. Google (Gmail) actually provides a service for email where you can use their software with your own domain. For example, I could use the Gmail engine to manage my miket@themembersgroup.com email address and NOT have to go through Outlook or Microsoft Exchange.
We’re not talking about CUs/banks creating bank123@gmail.com addresses.
Heath S.
Exactly, thanks Mike! @Tony: Have you looked into any of the Google Security and Privacy policies? This may make you feel more comfortable with using GMail as well as knowing you can force all users to use HTTPS
Tony M.
I see, you are talking about using “Google Exchange” instead of “Microsoft Exchange”.
Thats pretty interesting. I will look into that a s a possible solution for our company. Since I am a pretty Die-Hard google guy, it could be a neat experiment.
Thanks for the clarification!
Robbie W.
We’ve joked about it at our CU, but there are some integration pieces missing. I know that the enterprise version of gmail (the one you pay for) has some integration options, but having never used them, I can’t speak directly to it. Getting the regulators over it would be another major hurdle, but most everybody understands that email isn’t secure, so what does it matter if it is an Exchange server or a Google server?
Brad G.
Per Robbie – “Getting the regulators over it would be another major hurdle”
Per Me – Bring it on. I love to discuss this out w/ ANY regulator. I think the regulators that aren’t ok with it are the ones that aren’t educated about it. So, again, bring it!