Banking Law

Tomorrow's a bank holiday and because of that I expect traffic to be light for the rest of the week. For those who do stop by over the next couple of days, however, I provide the following "quick hits" to a few items that might be of interest:

• The American Banker's Jeff Horwitz has an investigative piece in today's edition that the editors have taken outside the firewall (in other words, access to the article is free). Jeff's looked under some rocks in the field of residential mortgage servicing and he's found that false affidavits and sloppy foreclosure processing paperwork aren't the only things that have come scurrying out. A scandal-in-the-making could be the matter of "forced-placed insurance" and the unholy alliance between servicers and insurers. There's enough here to trouble not only borrower's and their counsel, but also federal regulators (including HUD, which smells RESPA burning), state insurance supervisors, and investors. Sometimes it takes a financial disaster to uncover the worst facets of a business that were covered up and let slide when real estate values were rising like a Dallas socialite's hairdo. I can't believe this is the last piece we're going to read on this subject.
• At last month's BAI Retail Deliver conference, "mobile banking" was such a hot topic that it should have come with its own fire extinguisher. Tracy Kitten at The Farud Blog looks at the security vulnerabilities in mobile banking and finds plenty of blame to go around.
• Linda McGlasson of The Agency Insider blog examines other security threats, these to debit and credit cards. "Flash Attacks" and "Blitz Attacks" might sound like subjects that would be of concern to the US military; however, its banks and their customers that are the victims. Linda speaks the truth when she warns that "criminals are continuing to evolve their attack methods and the technology used to commit the fraud." It's a never-ending battle and bankers have to keep on top of it.
• Edwards Angell Palmer & Dodge has a nice client advisory on the FTC's "red flag rules" that go into effect December 31, 2010. By now, all financial institutions should have been all over this subject matter, but as we saw with multi-factor authentication a couple of years ago, there are always laggards. As the firm points out, the definitional net of "financial institutions" is cast far and wide.
• On November 16, I'll be moderating a panel on a webinar for Bank Law Stuff that will discuss how banks and other financial institutions should handle crisis communications to meet the expectations of the banking regulators and to survive PR perils when "bad things happen to good banks." The panelists will be Sharlyn Lauby, president of ITM Group of Ft. Lauderdale, Florida, and Tom Bieging, a long-time banking lawyer and counsel to the Independent Bankers of Colorado. I'll be throwing in my two cents worth (or, if I'm lucky, four cents worth), as well.

Have a great day off and a great weekend.