Report: Improving Legacy Systems, Cybersecurity Top Challenges for Payments Professionals

A survey published this week by ETA member TD Bank has identified improving legacy systems as the greatest challenge facing payments professionals this year.

According to the survey, which polled 498 attendants of a recent industry conference, 42 percent of respondents said that they consider making improvements to existing legacy infrastructure the top industry challenge for 2019. This represents a six point increase in concern over the issue since 2018, one that the survey concludes “demonstrates slow and minimal efforts to improve payments and processing systems over the last 12 months.”

Unsurprisingly, cybersecurity was the next most pressing issue identified by the surveyed payments professionals – 30 percent of respondents said it was their top obstacle. In 2018, 32 percent reported it as their top concern, indicating the presence of cybersecurity as consistent challenge for payments professionals to overcome. Interestingly, 85 percent said the expected cybersecurity to become a bigger threat in the next one or two years. Eighty-eight percent said they believe their organization should conquer cybersecurity through in-house development. Only 12 percent said they preferred to outsource prevention to an expert, the survey found.

Click here to read more from TD Bank.