Although the financial community has been quick to embrace the Internet, two major handicaps are impeding fuller use of it - security and reliability. Most banks have moved beyond putting simple brochureware on their World Wide Web sites and are publishing their research as well. The next step in the process - about a year ago it was the source of many brave words about what could be achieved - is to use the medium for transactions.
This is where progress is beginning to hit a wall. Although the private-client groups of many banks already offer on-line share dealing and other transactional services, banks have been reticent about extending these to the corporate and institutional level. Internet security has been substantially improved in the last few months, but public perception that this is the case is still lacking. The news that the latest version of Microsoft's Internet Explorer web browser software contained a...
