Indian banks ordered to streamline ATM security upgrades

This includes the installation of anti-skimming devices and whitelisting solutions by 2019.

The Reserve Bank of India (RBI) ordered banks to speed up the installation of anti-skimming devices and whitelisting solutions in all ATM machines in the country by 2019 in an effort to combat the growing number of card crimes, reports The Times of India. 

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Whitelisting solutions enable only trusted applications to work on the machine and blocks all other programmes.

Banks also have to implement a host of other security measures including the disabling of auto-run facilities and application of operating systems patches, terminal security solutions and time-based admin access by August.

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"The slow progress on the part of the banks in addressing these issues has been viewed seriously by the RBI," the central bank said in a circular to heads of banks and white label ATM operators.

“As you may appreciate, the vulnerability arising from the banks’ ATMs operating on unsupported version of operating system and non-implementation of other security measures, could potentially affect the interests of the banks’ customers adversely, apart from such occurrences, if any, impinging on the image of the bank,” RBI added.