Executive summary
In providing banking services, the ruling its very clear, at least in Mexico’s rules, laws and regulations. The Banks should be the responsible ones in conducting and maintaining the service to their customers. However, there are different circumstances which may mitigate when a bank fails in providing such services. How to differentiate when it’s a management’s responsibility and when is something more broad and general out of their scope of influence?
Operational failures
Its becoming very often banks fail in delivering their services, due to suppliers break downs. However it is pretty obvious when you may be affected by the bankers responsibility and when its not. Let me explain.
Do you remember when the What’s App broke down?
Social networks are sites and applications that operate in different areas such as social, professional, business, and others; they constantly allow the exchange of information between people and organizations. Today, most companies take advantage of the rise of social networks; they are utilized to obtain greater visibility, increase awareness of the brand, and generate trust in the public by favoring direct contact with their customers and creating a community of loyal fans. However, very few of them do celebrate contracts or agreements individually with their parties, despite of the fact of their usability.
When we talk about a social network, the first things that come to mind are sites like Facebook, Twitter, and LinkedIn or applications like WhatsApp and Instagram, classics of this era. It is not surprising that most businesses that operate through the Internet are based on this type of website. This makes them the best social networks for creating companies and businesses, as long as they are directed to the final audience.
On October 4 of this year, there was a blackout of several hours of the social networks Instagram, Facebook, and WhatsApp, which caused many people and organizations in the region and the world to notice how much they depend on these platforms. Certain users were anxious since someone did not respond to that desired message. Others could not report the progress of the negotiation. Others perceived a calmer afternoon by not receiving work messages due to not using digital platforms and applications.
The incident caused tens of thousands of Internet users in the United States, Mexico, France, Romania, Norway, Georgia, Greece, and other countries to report not accessing services. The problems were also detected in Germany, Chile, and other regions of the planet.[1] It is usual for websites and applications to experience interruptions, although it is rare to occur globally.
Although most organizations do not recognize Instagram, Facebook, and WhatsApp as proper work tools, there was an effect on the employees’ productivity; this evidenced the organization’s dependence on social networks.[2] It is estimated that the interruption has affected the world economy with a figure that exceeds 1,000 million dollars. Therefore, the New York Stock Exchange closed in red, and the Dow Jones Industrials Index, its leading indicator, fell 0.94 percent, in another gloomy day for the technology sector due to market rotation, the rise in interest of the public debt, and the problems of Facebook and the other networks it controls.[3]
Due to the fall of social networks, many companies in Latin America that have their primary sales and logistics channel on the platforms presented massive economic losses. According to the Cost of Closure tool, the estimates of losses were stratospheric in Latin American countries; for its part, Mexico had a loss of US $13.803.751, although it is not the only country in the region that was directly affected, it ranks second only after Brazil in the most significant amount of lost revenue.[4]
Banks do transactions through Whats App, but as stated, they are not considered as official or proper work tools and they do not monitor or suveill their services since they are on broad basis.
The ravages of the recent fall of the essential social networks at the international level not only caused consequences in the abstinence of communication of people around the world but also unleashed a series of suspicions in which even politicians are uncertain of the main reasons for this incident, in addition to this, the sociological implications of social networks on people concerning social networks have caused at least one in five American teenagers to feel worse about themselves.[5]
Many of the complaints raised have been directed to the Internet in general since the regulation of the content that can be observed in social networks such as Facebook is not fully controlled; the dilemmas about how the company amplifies attention and how to draw the line between defending freedom expression and minimizing damage. Facebook reiterated its request that Congress intervene on minimum ages rather than leaving it to companies. However, suspicions about the mishandling of information from Facebook have increased and considerably, for its part, rumors such as Facebook that it has suppressed the actions carried out to resolve freedom of expression issues with has implied a decrease in its young US users, resulting in a drop in adolescent participation that could lead to an overall 45% decline in US users over the next two years.
Currently, for Facebook, it does not represent a serious problem even though its actions have lagged behind some technological giants, it has increased almost 30% in the last 12 months, but in matters of reputational risk, the Department of Justice of the United States had affirmed that Facebook is a monopoly is based on defining its market to exclude the majority of social networks and this is reflected when, due to the interruption, users flocked to applications such as Telegram, TikTok and Twitter to carry out their activities.
I think its pretty clear this kind of responsibility falls on the third party, not on the banking system.
However, there are a vast number of banking institutions with lack of personnel due to cost-cutting and poor awareness of staffing issues on the part of executives that would be the cause to blame for recent system failures, following investigations into the series of glitches that left many of the bank’s customers frustrated when this events happen.
Conclusion
No question Banking is one of the most sensitive services. Their BRP and BDP have been tested by earthquaques, pandemias, cyber-attacks, and so on.
However, we have recently seen a constant banking operational failures in our country which are difficult to understand and which are not cleared nor commented by the authorities on the source of their problem and if they had to be submitted to a monitoring and mitigation program for them to be reviewed and monitored until they do not show additional problems.
As it is discussed above, we have not seen either, any corporate governance measures in any of the important banks with this incidents, nor any reaction or preasure on them. Difficult to see the C-Suite Bank as it did in Mizuho, being accountable on the failures and responsible by their actions.
Japanese culture its definitely in other league.
[1] Bloomberg, Facebook, WhatsApp e Instagram sufren una caída generalizada, October 4 2021.
[2] Deloitte, Lecciones tras la caída de WhatsApp, 2021.
[3] El Tiempo, La multimillonaria afectación mundial por la caída de las redes sociales, October 5 2021.
[4] CNN, Facebook: ¿Cuánto dinero habría perdido cada país de América Latina por la caída de 6 horas de la red social?, October 5, 2021.
[5] The Economist, Facebook is nearing a reputational point of no return, October 9, 2021.