"We have supported the artificial intelligence (AI) transformation of financial companies such as Samsung Card and Woori Bank. We have solutions at a level that can lead the industry."
Hwang Soo-young (pictured), Vice President for Financial Services at Samsung SDS, made these remarks in a recent meeting with The Seoul Economic Daily at the company's headquarters in Jamsil, Seoul, saying, "We have ample know-how in the AX of large, mid-sized, and small financial companies."
Samsung SDS recently drew industry attention after being selected as the preferred bidder for a project to build AI agents for Woori Bank's AX. Woori Bank's project is a large-scale initiative to introduce AI agents across 29 key operations, including customer relationship management (CRM), corporate lending, asset management, internal controls, customer consultation, and business automation. The industry expects that, depending on how the project unfolds, the AX movement will spread rapidly not only to other commercial banks but also to the securities, insurance, and card industries. "Bankers can use AI agents when creating customer asset management analysis reports or analyzing companies," Hwang said. "Private banking (PB) customers and corporate clients will feel that services are provided more quickly and accurately through bankers."
Beyond banks, insurance companies and card firms are already pushing to introduce AI by service. "Insurers want to use AI for subscription design and automating customer consultation," Hwang said. "Visa and Mastercard are testing and verifying an 'agent commerce' function that automates even payments."
While AX is being introduced rapidly in the financial sector, concerns are also emerging that AI could heighten security threats. AI-driven security threats have grown recently, as it became known that Anthropic's cybersecurity-specialized AI model "Claude Mythos Preview" can find vulnerabilities that humans have failed to recognize. "Security patches for vulnerabilities discovered through Mythos will pour out," he said. "If security patches come out all at once, it could cause disruptions in the financial system, so the financial sector continues to have security concerns."
Hwang advised that for AX in the financial sector to succeed, it is necessary to put in place a governance system prepared for this. "Internal rules and management systems must be created, such as which AI services are used in the organization and how much graphics processing unit (GPU) resources they consume," he said. "When developing an in-house AI agent, the functions must all be included, such as examining whether the agent conforms to internal ethics guidelines and judging whether to approve it."
"As banks build next-generation computing networks, there are many requests to include AI code assistants," Hwang said. "Requests come in not only to write new code but also to convert C language into Java." A code assistant is a function that uses AI in the process of interpreting existing code or writing new code. Using it can not only shorten development periods but also produce standardized code that is not swayed by individual developers' tendencies or preferences. "Going forward, demand to turn many tasks into agents will increase, and to respond properly, an understanding of not only technology but also operations and existing legacy systems must be in place," Hwang said. "Samsung SDS aims to be well prepared for the agentic era."
