Australia, 17 November 2023 – FS-ISAC, the member-driven, not-for-profit organisation that advances cybersecurity and resilience in the global financial system, announced today the winners of its third annual Global Leaders awards. The Global Leaders award honours outstanding members dedicated to advancing cybersecurity and resilience within the financial sector across the four regions of APAC, EMEA, Latin America, and North America.

This year, cybersecurity professionals were recognised from Banco Mercantil del Norte, CIBC, Macquarie Group Limited, PNC, and Santander for their commitment to FS-ISAC’s pillars of intelligence, security, and resilience through cross-border collaboration, cyber intelligence sharing, and collective defence against emerging cyber threats.

“In the face of persistent cyber threats in the ANZ region, financial institutions must band together and foster industry collaboration to actively share knowledge, threat intelligence, and best practices. This year’s deserving recipients of our Global Leaders awards have been consistent and proactive in doing so, going the extra mile to facilitate sharing and collaboration among peers and partners within the financial services sector,” stated Lachlan Pope, Regional Director AU, NZ & Indo-Pacific at FS-ISAC.

As Australia continues to see a relentless surge in cyber attacks, the cost of a data breach in Australia has increased by 32% over the last five years, according to IBM’s Cost Of Data Breach Report 2023, which now stands at AUD $4.03 million on average. Additionally, approximately 2 million Australian accounts were compromised during Q3 of 2023, translating to an average of about 15 user accounts breached every minute between April and June.

Global Leaders winner for APAC, David Gee, Global Head of Cyber, Technology, and Data Risk at Macquarie Group Limited, said, “As the threat landscape evolves, so does the regulatory environment, and it is imperative that the financial sector remains up to date on the latest cyber resilience tactics and compliance needs. At Macquarie Group Limited, we’ve collaborated to build a regional community, including working through the CERES Forum around regulatory harmonisation to ensure industry-wide security progression through information sharing.”

“Building strong partnerships and trust across FS-ISAC’s members increases awareness of the cyber threat landscape and builds collective resilience for the financial sector at large,” said David Broad, Senior Manager, Cyber Security Partnerships at CIBC, Global Leaders winner for North America. “We are honoured to be recognised for contributions that safeguard the industry and further FS-ISAC’s work in Canada, including the formation of the Canadian Intelligence Council, the Incident Response Team Council, and the Canadian CISO Council.”

“This year, we made significant strides within our intelligence sharing community, partnering with FS-ISAC to form the Europe Board of Directors and expand our dissemination of cyber intelligence on the European cyber ecosystem across the region,” said Marina Nogales, Global Head of Cyber External Engagement at Santander, Global Leaders winner for Europe, UK, Middle East and Africa. “We are delighted to receive this recognition, as it reaffirms Santander’s strategic work to protect our customers from rapidly evolving cyber threats.”

“Financial institutions across Latin America have been working to connect members and public sector authorities with the goal of building security maturity and resilience of the industry through increased intelligence and knowledge sharing,” said Alejandro Nunez, Head of Cyber Threat Intelligence at Banco Mercantil del Norte, Global Leaders winner for Latin America. “This award highlights our ongoing efforts to strengthen our cross-border collaboration in the region.”

“Coordination across functions and even across sectors is critical to managing risk and keeping bad actors at bay,” said Samuel Strohm, Senior Vice President and Director, Global Security Fusion Center at PNC, Global Leaders winner for North America. “Sharing actionable cyber threat intelligence and best practices are just some of the ways PNC’s Global Security Fusion Center actively contributes to the protection of the global financial sector and the general population at large.”

Submissions were considered by FS-ISAC subject matter experts for industry impact and member contributions and narrowed down to two to three finalists per region. The winners were chosen by a selection committee in each region made up of members from that region. In the North America region, two winners were recognised.

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About FS-ISAC
FS-ISAC is the member-driven, not-for-profit organization that advances cybersecurity and resilience in the global financial system, protecting the financial institutions and the people they serve. Founded in 1999, the organization’s real-time information sharing network amplifies the
intelligence, knowledge, and practices of its members for the financial sector’s collective security and defenses. Member financial firms represent $100 trillion in assets in 75 countries.

Contacts for Media
media@fsisac.com
Colin Lau:
FS-ISAC@bluetotem.co
+65 8182 3633