ATMs at risk

Our speaker on Tuesday mentioned an interesting fact that most ATMs in the world rely on outdated operating systems. I found this fact interesting and researched it further. It turns out that 95 percent of the world’s ATMs run on Windows XP, a 12-year old operating system. This fact has been in the news recently because Microsoft will stop supporting Windows XP in a matter of days on April 8. The very reason that Microsoft is no longer supporting XP causes concern for ATM users: “XP no longer meets the needs of modern computing and doesn’t have the cyber-security safeguards in place to protect against the current generation of threats.” Banks have had plenty of time to switch over to newer technologies because Microsoft announced the April 8 date back in 2007. While some banks, like JP Morgan Chase, have purchased service extensions, others will let their ATM technology go unserviced. This fact puts banks and their customers at risk for cyber attacks that are becoming more and more sophisticated every day. The average consumer has no way of telling if they are using an unserviced ATM. Customers around the world will be nervous to use an ATM, but few people in developed countries will stop using them. We know that our banks and governmental regulatory agencies insure our money if hackers steal it. But people in developing nations, where there is often little trust in the financial sector or government will be even less likely to trust technology that is meant to make their lives easier. If hackers do steal money from people who use ATMs, there may not be any ways to get that money back. Unserviced ATMs are a vulnerability that hit developing countries especially hard.

ATM design solutions in India

Click here for Youtube video of Saral Bank project in India

The Saral Bank in India resigned an ATM for users in rural India. Currently, a large amount of people in rural India do not have access to basic banking services and are cut off from formal financial services because banks do not think that these people are viable customers. However, the Saral Bank saw the need in these areas for banks, and decided to provide a bank for this population. However, they knew that in order to make their bank successful, they would have to cater to the local population’s needs. The current ATM’s that exist in most places require a certain level of ATM exposure and literacy. There are confusing buttons, inconsistencies in hardware, differences in interfaces, linguistic barriers, confusing slots, and many times they are in constrained environments. The Saral Bank recognized this and decided that they needed to change the design solution of their ATM’s to be more refined and interactive so that the people in the rural areas where they were setting up their services could use them more successfully. The bank spent time studying the behavior of the users towards the ATM’s to see what exactly it was that they needed in an ATM. After doing this, the Saral Bank came up with an ATM that catered precisely towards the rural Indian population. This ATM had different language and dialect options, voice based assistance as well as text, easy to understand visuals (such as pictures of the exact monetary bills), a simple and intuitive touch based interface, and a much simpler transaction process. Furthermore, it allows people to deposit smaller amounts of money into their accounts and uses cardless banking because it is a more secure system.

This project reminded me of the Tongia and Subrahmanian reading we did in class last week, Tongia and Subrahmanian pointed out that one common shortcoming of stakeholders in ICT4D is that “many of the targeted beneficiaries are “disconnected” from the mainstream… lack not only physical connectivity but social or political avenues for participation” (p.3). What they are essentially saying is that one of the main stakeholders in ICT4D projects are the people who the projects are being implemented for, and many times, these people have absolutely no voice in the project, when they should have the most voice because if the projects do not fit their needs they will not use them. One recommendation for success pointed out by Tongia and Subrahmanian is having the bottom of the pyramid be more of a focus for the ICT industry. Tongia and Subrahmanian say that “recognizing the bottom of the pyramid as an untapped market has not yet resulted in major, fundamental innovations by the ICT industry, though they are working on improving the size, scale, costs and robustness of their offerings.” (p.3).  This is exactly what the Saral Bank in India did. They studied the behavior of the rural Indian users towards the ATM’s, asked them what they would like to change about them, and then designed the ATM’s exactly for their needs.