An SAS-sponsored survey of retail and commercial banking executives says financial institutions are frequently targeted by cyber threats and constantly working to build up their defense postures.

Many of the 250 respondents to the Cyberrisk in Banking survey cited customer trust as the most significant loss incurred from any attack, SAS said Wednesday.

One-fifth of those polled regard preparedness as a key ingredient in mitigating cybersecurity risks and one-fourth of respondents reported that they have internal processes ready in case of an attack.

Respondents identified phishing, botnets and mobile malware as the most likely threats and slightly more than half of interviewees noted that monetary losses have not reached enough of an amount to get the attention of senior executives.

“This is partly because most organizations handle security as an extension of IT rather than viewing it as an operational risk,” said Christopher Smith, director of cyber strategies at SAS.

Tools such as context-aware analytics and other security applications are designed to help enterprises notice trends and create risk-based responses to head off probable attacks, SAS says.

“Though cybersecurity is clearly a cross-industry issue, financial institutions are leading a trend toward convergence of fraud and cybercrime prevention technology and operations in support of a holistic approach to cybersecurity,” said Stu Bradley, director of security intelligence solutions at SAS.

“This strategy will require new capabilities, not least to fill gaps in the technology marketplace as part of solving the biggest data challenges to date, and in proactively using better analytics to make real-time, risk-based decisions,” he added.

SAS commissioned Longitude Research to survey executives in North America, Europe and Latin America.