The bank would likely have a backup system, so a single server malfunction wouldn’t be enough to bring the bank to its technological knees. I suspect that this was a coordinated attack by one or several disgruntled insiders who could have crashed the system with a can of coke! That’s right, they could have spilled the contents of a can of coke on a few well-placed servers and crashed the entire system. Perhaps the perpetrators had an axe to grind and this was their opportunity. Maybe it wasn’t a highly placed individual but a humble technician – merely a name on a payroll register – with an access card to the bowels of the bank and a motive and the means to disembowel a giant in order to make their point.
It’s hard to imagine it could be that easy, but that is the sad truth. With all of their resources, safeguards, security, manuals and audits, their system crashed and burned. Several weeks later the Royal Bank was still wiping the yolk off their face. I suspect the reason it took so long is because of the time it takes to install new servers. You just don’t plug in a Cray supercomputer and boot it up.
My point is, don’t put all your eggs in one basket. If you rely on one computer and that computer fails, your eggs are cooked. If you have only one customer and they leave you, there’s no money to buy more eggs. If you rely on one bank – as many of the RBC’s customers did – then you are at their mercy when they drop your basket. In business, the best defense is simply to diversify.
I strongly advocate that you deal with at least two separate banks for a number of reasons, not the least of which is protecting yourself from any mistakes the bank makes. Furthermore, if all your banking is at one institution, you’re also at the mercy of their ‘risk management’ scrutiny. If everything is smooth, there’s nothing to worry about but when you’re struggling and looking for a hand, it’ll be difficult to convince your sole banker that the glass is really half full.
“Go forth and diversify” should be the commandment as far as business is concerned. Diversification in all manner of doing business is your safety net. Spread your business around. Get lots of customers. Access many suppliers. Use many banks. Do back ups and use safeguards. When you rely on one, single machine, person, item, product, solution, customer or supplier, you risk being cut off at the knees. Deal from the strength founded in choice. Whether you are a buyer or a seller, your strength comes from being able to walk away because no business is better than bad business. Don’t put all your eggs in one basket, and the yolk will never be on you.