Deutsche Bank’s chief security officer and head of cloud transformation has said that the bank focusses on identity and data as core fundamental features of cloud protection.

“Identity and data are at the heart of security and cloud – if we can’t get that right it doesn’t work,” Brent Philips told delegates at Money 2020 Europe on Tuesday.

He added: “If we can understand who they are and what they have access to – the marrying of those two gives us a lot of flexibility”.

Philips also said that the bank, which recently saw profits reach their highest level since 2013, looks at cloud and security transformation as “two parallel activities”, adding that alignment of these two areas gives Deutsche bank "lots of synergies”.

The security lead also highlighted the importance of creating the right business culture when it comes to cloud transformation and security.

“A cultural shift is important,” he told attendees at the Amsterdam-based event. “Security bridges the gap – if you do it correctly you can enable that digital transformation to take place.”

Deutsche Bank’s head of cloud transformation also said that the bank had found regulatory regimes on a global scale challenging, explaining that it has to be prepared for “data sovereignty”. He said that while regulations are great for protecting users, they make it harder to operate in a greater business at scale.

Referring to the Digital Operational Resilience Act (DORA) - the regulatory framework on digital operational resilience whereby all firms need to make sure they can withstand, respond to and recover from digital threats - he said that historically the bank looked across different implementations of the rules and struggled to meet the legislation’s intentions.

However, the bank has since changed tack by looking at data and its processes and flows as a whole.

Prior to the introduction of these regulations, financial insitutions managed the main categories of operational risk mainly with the allocation of capital, but they did not manage all components of operational resilience.

Now firms they must also follow rules for the protection, detection, containment, recovery and repair capabilities against ICT-related incidents.

Deutsche Bank profit before tax was up 12 per cent year-on-year to € 1.9 billion in its latest financial quarter, with net revenue growth jumping five per cent to € 7.7. billion – the highest in seven years.

Money 2020 Europe is taking place at the RAI in Amsterdam 6-8 June 2023.

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