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Technology Risk Advisory for
Financial Institutions
FFIEC examiners hold your institution accountable for vendor risk, not just the vendor.
MALA's advisors — with banking-sector experience — review your vendor management
program before an exam finds the gaps, at zero upfront cost.
Before the Call Comes: Technology Risk Advisory for Financial Institutions
FFIEC examiners hold your institution accountable for vendor risk — not just the vendor.
Community banks and credit unions face specific technology risks that generalist advisory doesn't cover: FFIEC vendor-management expectations, third-party risk oversight, and operational resilience requirements tied directly to examiner findings, not just general IT best practice.
What examiners actually check: pre-contract due diligence, risk-tiering proportional to vendor criticality, specific contract provisions (audit rights, breach notification, subcontracting disclosure), ongoing monitoring, and board-level reporting on critical vendor relationships.
How MALA helps: a structured, independent review of vendor contracts and oversight documentation before an exam — not during one.
Why Generalist IT Consultants Miss Bank-Specific Requirements
A generic IT vendor review checks security. It doesn't check what an examiner will ask for.
FFIEC guidance expects specific documentation: due diligence performed before a vendor was onboarded, criticality tiers applied consistently, and contract language covering audit rights and fourth-party subcontracting — details a general technology consultant without banking-sector experience typically doesn't know to look for.
What this looks like in practice: a due-diligence file that hasn't been touched since onboarding, criticality tiers set once and never revisited, or a contract silent on breach-notification timelines — all common exam findings that a generalist review misses.
How MALA Approaches a Reality Assessment for a Financial Institution
Advisors with banking-sector experience, not a generic technology checklist.
MALA's assessment for a financial institution inventories every vendor contract and oversight document, tiers vendors by criticality the way an examiner expects, benchmarks pricing against market rates, and flags specific documentation gaps before an exam finds them.
Deliverable: a prioritized set of findings mapped to what FFIEC guidance and your examiners actually look for — not a generic security audit relabeled for banking.
What's the Real Cost of an Operational-Risk Incident?
For a mid-size bank or credit union, an operational-risk incident costs more than the remediation line item.
Beyond direct incident-response cost, a mid-size institution faces examiner scrutiny, member or customer notification obligations, and reputational impact in a community where trust is the product. These costs rarely show up in a standard IT risk assessment that wasn't built for a regulated financial institution.
Further reading: see MALA's guide on what FFIEC examiners actually look for in vendor management.
Building a Defensible Vendor-Management Program Without a Large Team
What technology vendor risks matter most to bank examiners? Due diligence, criticality tiering, contract provisions, ongoing monitoring, and board reporting — in that order of frequency as exam findings.
Most community banks and credit unions don't have a dedicated third-party risk team. A defensible program doesn't require one — it requires a consistent inventory, criticality tiers, and a review cadence, built once with outside help and then maintained internally.
MALA runs this initial build at zero upfront cost, structured so your team can maintain it going forward rather than depending on an ongoing outside relationship.
Who this is for: CIOs, CISOs, compliance officers, and boards at community banks and credit unions preparing for or recovering from an exam.
Cost: zero upfront — MALA is compensated by a participating vendor only if you move forward with a recommendation.
Ready Before the Examiner Asks?
In a 30-minute conversation, a MALA advisor will review your current vendor-management documentation and give you a direct read on where the gaps are before an examiner finds them.