Brigient is a Canadian cybersecurity consulting firm headquartered in Mississauga, Ontario, providing specialized cybersecurity services for financial institutions across Canada — including banks, credit unions, fintechs, wealth management firms, and insurance companies. This page covers Brigient’s cybersecurity services for Canadian financial services organizations: OSFI B-13 compliance programs, identity and access management (IAM), 24/7 incident and breach response, adversary simulations, and cyber security program development.
OSFI B-13-aligned cyber programs, privileged access management, and 24/7 incident response — built for Canadian banks, credit unions, fintechs, and insurance firms across Ontario and Canada.
Financial institutions are among the most targeted organizations in the world, and in Canada, they are also among the most heavily regulated. Canadian banks, credit unions, and fintechs must simultaneously defend against sophisticated cyber threats and demonstrate to OSFI, their boards, and their customers that they have a governed, risk-based cyber program in place.
Meeting those dual demands, real security and regulatory evidence, requires more than a checklist. It requires a cybersecurity partner who understands the Canadian financial regulatory landscape as deeply as they understand the threat environment your organization faces every day.
Brigient works with Canadian financial institutions of all sizes, from Ontario credit unions and GTA-based fintechs to national insurance companies and regional banks, to build measurable, regulator-ready cybersecurity programs that reduce real risk and demonstrate documented accountability.
OSFI Guideline B-13 (Technology and Cyber Risk Management) is Canada’s mandatory cyber risk standard for all federally regulated financial institutions (FRFIs). It requires documented governance frameworks, board-level accountability, technology asset management, incident response capabilities, and third-party risk programs. Brigient conducts B-13 gap assessments and builds the documented cyber programs that satisfy OSFI examinations and protect your organization against real threats.
OSFI Guideline B-13, published July 31, 2022 by the Office of the Superintendent of Financial Institutions, is the definitive technology and cyber risk management standard for all federally regulated financial institutions in Canada. It applies to Schedule I and II banks, trust companies, life insurance and fraternal companies, property and casualty companies, foreign bank branches, and federal credit unions operating in Canada.
B-13 is organized into three domains, each with a defined outcome OSFI expects FRFIs to achieve:
Domain 1 — Governance and Risk Management: Technology and cyber risks are governed through clear accountabilities, board-level structures, and a comprehensive technology and cyber risk management framework (RMF). Senior Management must assign clear responsibility for cyber risk governance to named roles — including CTO, CIO, or CISO equivalents.
Domain 2 — Technology Operations and Resilience: A stable, scalable, and resilient technology environment supported by robust operations, patch management, change management, disaster recovery, and system development lifecycle (SDLC) security controls.
Domain 3 — Cyber Security: A secure technology posture maintaining the confidentiality, integrity, and availability of FRFI technology assets — covering Identify, Defend, Detect, and Respond/Recover/Learn capabilities.
For the full text of OSFI Guideline B-13, visit osfi-bsif.gc.ca — Technology and Cyber Risk Management
OSFI B-13 applies to all federally regulated financial institutions (FRFIs) operating in Canada, including chartered banks (Schedule I and II), trust and loan companies, federal credit unions, life insurance companies, fraternal benefit societies, property and casualty insurers, and foreign bank and insurance branches authorized to operate in Canada. For provincially regulated credit unions in Ontario — governed by the Financial Services Regulatory Authority of Ontario (FSRA) — B-13 does not apply directly, but FSRA guidance increasingly mirrors B-13 expectations and provincial credit unions that aspire to B-13 alignment are considered best-practice leaders.
Under OSFI’s Technology and Cyber Security Incident Reporting Advisory (separate from but related to B-13), FRFIs are required to report technology and cyber security incidents to OSFI promptly. B-13 Domain 3 requires FRFIs to maintain a cyber incident taxonomy, documented response playbooks, and a 24/7-capable incident response team. Post-incident, FRFIs must conduct root cause analysis and implement remediation — documentation that Brigient’s post-breach reporting provides directly.
During an OSFI supervisory examination of cyber risk, examiners evaluate whether the FRFI has: documented its cyber risk governance framework; assigned senior accountability for technology and cyber risk; maintained a current technology asset inventory; established and tested incident response plans; assessed and managed third-party risk; and implemented the identity and access management controls (including MFA and privileged access management) specified in B-13 section 3.2.7.
The most common OSFI examination findings Brigient encounters in gap assessments are: absence of a documented cyber risk management framework; inadequate third-party risk assessment processes; untested incident response playbooks; and privileged access without formal management controls. Brigient’s risk consulting engagements are structured to close these gaps before an examination reveals them.
Most Ontario financial institutions — particularly credit unions, regional lenders, and fintechs — have implemented basic security controls but lack the documented governance layer that B-13 and FSRA scrutiny require. A firewall and antivirus software do not constitute a cyber risk management framework. B-13 requires evidence: written policies, documented risk assessments, tested playbooks, board reporting, and third-party assessment records. Brigient specializes in building the evidence layer on top of existing controls — transforming what organizations are already doing into a documented, auditable, regulator-ready program.
Canadian financial institutions face six primary cybersecurity threats: business email compromise (BEC) on financial transactions, ransomware targeting core banking systems, insider threats from privileged access abuse, third-party and API supply chain risk, cloud misconfiguration in modern banking infrastructure, and phishing attacks targeting operations and finance staff. Each represents a distinct attack vector requiring a specific defensive strategy.
Business email compromise (BEC) is the single highest-cost cyber crime category for financial services organizations. Attackers compromise or impersonate executive email accounts to redirect wire transfers, authorize fraudulent payments, and intercept M&A deal communications. BEC attacks are particularly effective against financial operations teams at Ontario credit unions, GTA wealth management firms, and regional banks where wire transfer authorizations rely on email confirmation rather than out-of-band verification. Brigient’s adversary simulation team designs BEC-specific phishing exercises and wire transfer authorization protocol reviews calibrated to financial sector attack patterns.
Modern ransomware groups targeting Canadian financial institutions do not simply encrypt files — they exfiltrate customer financial data first, then threaten public exposure unless a ransom is paid. This double-extortion model simultaneously triggers technical containment obligations, OSFI incident notification, PIPEDA customer notification assessment, cyber insurance engagement, and potential regulatory reporting. Brigient’s incident response team manages all of these parallel tracks, with direct experience working alongside major Canadian cyber insurance carriers from day one of a financial sector ransomware incident.
High staff turnover in financial operations and IT roles, combined with overprivileged access to core banking systems, creates significant insider threat exposure unique to the financial sector. Former employees retaining system access after departure, contractors with excessive permissions to customer account data, and service accounts with no expiry dates are among the most frequently found — and most preventable — vulnerabilities Brigient identifies during IAM assessments of Ontario financial institutions.
Toronto and the GTA host one of North America’s most active fintech ecosystems. Fintechs and digital-first banks typically depend on dozens of third-party API integrations for payment processing, identity verification, data aggregation, open banking connectivity, and customer onboarding. Each integration is a potential attack vector. OSFI B-13 Section 3 and Guideline B-10 (Outsourcing) both specifically mandate third-party risk management, yet most fintechs have no formal process for assessing vendor security posture. Brigient’s third-party assurance service closes this gap with structured vendor security questionnaires, right-to-audit provisions, and supply chain risk registers.
As Canadian financial institutions migrate to AWS, Azure, and GCP, the speed of cloud adoption routinely outpaces security configuration. Misconfigured storage buckets, overpermissioned cloud IAM roles, unencrypted customer financial data, and publicly exposed API endpoints are among the most common findings in Brigient’s cloud security assessments of GTA-based financial organizations. These issues are inexpensive to remediate once identified — and extremely costly when discovered by an attacker or an OSFI examiner.
Brigient’s cybersecurity services for financial institutions follow the Identify. Respond. Recover. Govern. framework — a four-pillar approach that maps directly to OSFI B-13’s three domains and covers every stage of the cyber risk lifecycle. Services span risk consulting, IAM, incident response, adversary simulations, data recovery, and cyber security program development.
IDENTIFY
Brigient conducts structured risk assessments benchmarked against OSFI B-13, NIST CSF, and ISO 27001 to give Ontario and Canadian financial institutions a clear, prioritized view of where their cyber program is strong, where it is exposed, and exactly what is required to satisfy regulatory expectations. Assessments produce evidence-ready documentation — the kind OSFI examiners, your board’s risk committee, and your cyber insurer all require.
Includes: Technology risk assessments, Privacy Impact Assessments, IT compliance governance consulting, OSFI B-13 gap analysis, third-party risk assessments, PCI DSS scoping and readiness, DevSecOps assessments. → Explore Brigient’s Risk Consulting Services
You cannot govern what you cannot see, and OSFI B-13 Section 2.2 requires FRFIs to maintain a current, comprehensive technology asset inventory. Brigient maps your full asset landscape — including legacy systems, cloud environments, third-party integrations, and shadow IT — and classifies data by sensitivity and regulatory obligation, identifying all repositories of non-public personal financial information (NPPI) and mapping access against your access control policies.
Includes: Asset discovery and inventory, data classification by sensitivity and regulatory category, PCI DSS cardholder data environment scoping, cloud data visibility, B-13 Section 2.2 asset inventory compliance. → Explore Asset & Data Visibility Services
Identity is the primary attack perimeter in modern financial services — and OSFI B-13 Section 3.2.7 explicitly requires FRFIs to implement risk-based identity and access controls including MFA and privileged access management. Brigient’s IAM advisory services help financial institutions implement least-privilege access models, privileged access management (PAM) for core banking systems, MFA across all user populations, and automated provisioning and deprovisioning workflows.
For Toronto and GTA fintechs, Brigient also advises on customer identity architectures — including fraud-resistant onboarding, KYC/AML identity verification, and customer IAM (CIAM) platforms.
Includes: IAM program maturity assessment, privileged access management strategy, MFA implementation advisory, identity roadmap and solution blueprint, CIAM advisory for digital banking. → Explore IAM Services
RESPOND
When a breach occurs at a Canadian financial institution, multiple obligations begin simultaneously — regulatory notification, customer communication decisions, legal exposure, and insurer engagement all converge within hours. Brigient’s incident response team is trusted by major Canadian and international cyber insurance carriers and specializes in managing the multi-track response that financial sector incidents require.
Brigient’s IR Retainer for financial institutions provides priority access to the response team before an incident occurs, pre-agreed engagement terms aligned to your cyber insurance policy, and documented playbooks tailored to your regulatory obligations — including OSFI notification procedures, PIPEDA assessment protocols, and payment system isolation procedures.
Includes: 24/7 incident response, forensic investigation, ransomware negotiation, OSFI notification advisory, PIPEDA assessment, cyber insurance coordination, post-breach strategy and reporting, IR retainer, breach coaching, playbook development. → Explore Incident & Breach Response Services
Brigient’s adversary simulations are designed around the actual tactics, techniques, and procedures (TTPs) that threat actors use against Canadian financial institutions — not generic attack scripts. This includes BEC simulations targeting finance and executive teams, red team exercises against digital banking authentication flows, phishing campaigns calibrated to financial sector social engineering patterns, and third-party vendor impersonation attacks. B-13 Section 3.1.2 explicitly requires intelligence-led threat testing — Brigient’s simulations fulfill this requirement and produce the evidence of testing that OSFI examiners expect.
Includes: Red team engagements, BEC and financial phishing simulations, purple team exercises, third-party assurance testing, breach simulations, vulnerability and penetration testing. → Explore Adversary Simulation Services
RECOVER
Post-breach recovery in financial services requires a structured determination of the full scope of compromise, validation that restored systems are clean before reconnecting to payment networks and customer-facing channels, and documentation of recovery actions for regulatory reporting and insurance claims. Brigient manages this process with the discipline and auditability that Canadian financial institutions require under B-13 Section 3.4 and OSFI’s incident reporting expectations. → Explore Data & Technology Recovery
GOVERN
Many Canadian financial institutions — particularly Ontario credit unions, smaller regional lenders, and growth-stage Toronto fintechs — have security controls in place but no cohesive documented cyber security program. OSFI B-13 Domain 1 requires exactly that: a governed, risk-based program with board-level accountability and measurable outcomes. Brigient builds these programs from the ground up or matures existing ones, producing the governance framework, documented policies, risk register, vulnerability management program, and Executive Risk Oversight Dashboard that FRFIs need to satisfy both OSFI examinations and their own board risk committees.
Brigient’s vCISO service provides financial institutions with a dedicated senior security advisor who attends board and risk committee meetings, leads OSFI examination preparation, and drives the security roadmap — at a fraction of the cost of a full-time CISO hire.
Includes: OSFI B-13 cyber program development, NIST CSF/ISO 27001 alignment, risk and vulnerability management programs, policy development, vCISO services, Executive Risk Oversight Dashboard, ITSM security integration. → Explore Cyber Security Program Development
When evaluating a cybersecurity partner for your Canadian financial institution, five criteria are non-negotiable. These criteria apply whether you are a federally regulated bank, an Ontario credit union, a Toronto fintech, or a national insurance company.
Regulatory Fluency Specific to Canadian Financial Services The firm must speak OSFI B-13, PIPEDA, PCI DSS, FSRA guidance, and FINTRAC obligations fluently — not just reference them in a brochure. Ask specifically: How many OSFI B-13 gap assessments have they conducted? Have they prepared organizations for actual OSFI supervisory examinations? Do they understand the difference between how B-13 applies to Schedule I banks versus federal credit unions versus provincial credit unions under FSRA? Generic “compliance consulting” experience is not sufficient for the Canadian financial sector.
Cyber Insurance Carrier Relationships The best cybersecurity firms serving financial institutions work directly with Canadian and international cyber insurance carriers. This matters most during an active incident, when coordination between your insurer, legal team, and IR firm determines containment speed. A firm unknown to your insurer adds friction at exactly the moment speed is critical. Ask any prospective firm which Canadian cyber insurance carriers they have worked with directly on financial sector incidents.
Financial Sector Incident Response Track Record Ask specifically about their financial sector breach response experience — not general IR. Financial incidents involve regulatory notification, payment network isolation, customer communication, and legal privilege management simultaneously. A firm experienced only in general corporate incidents is not equipped for the regulatory complexity of a Canadian FRFI breach.
IAM Depth for Core Banking Environments Identity and access management is the primary attack vector in financial services. A firm that treats IAM as a secondary offering — bundled into a general “compliance” service — is not equipped for the core of your exposure. Evaluate whether the firm has specific IAM advisory capabilities: PAM for core banking systems, MFA architecture, CIAM for digital banking, and identity roadmap development.
Right-Sized Approach for Your Institution Type An Ontario credit union with $500M in assets has fundamentally different regulatory obligations, infrastructure constraints, and risk tolerance than a growth-stage Toronto fintech or a Schedule I bank. A qualified firm calibrates its assessment methodology, deliverable format, and remediation roadmap to your specific institution type — not to a fixed template applied to every financial sector client.
Canadian Banks and Trust Companies — Full-spectrum OSFI B-13 alignment, enterprise IAM program development, core banking IR retainer, red team testing of digital banking authentication, vCISO advisory.
Ontario Credit Unions and Caisses Populaires — Right-sized cyber programs for FSRA-regulated institutions navigating provincial requirements alongside OSFI B-13 best practices, typically without a dedicated security team. vCISO services are particularly high-value here.
Toronto and GTA Fintechs and Digital Banks — SOC 2 readiness, DevSecOps advisory, cloud security assessment, CIAM architecture, vCISO for enterprise sales support. Brigient helps GTA fintechs close enterprise procurement deals faster by building the documented security program that enterprise buyers require.
Insurance Companies and MGAs — Sensitive PII at scale, OSFI oversight for federally regulated insurers, agent and broker network phishing exposure, claims fraud through compromised identity systems, Privacy Impact Assessments for customer data programs.
Wealth Management and Investment Firms — Client financial data protection, IIROC/CSA compliance alignment, privileged access management for portfolio management systems, executive-targeted BEC and spear-phishing simulation.
Payment Processors and Merchant Services — PCI DSS compliance, cardholder data environment scoping, network segmentation assessment, third-party integrator risk management.
We Speak Regulator and Security Fluently Most cybersecurity firms speak technology. Brigient speaks both technology and Canadian financial regulation. Our consultants understand OSFI B-13, PIPEDA, PCI DSS, FINTRAC, and FSRA obligations at the level needed to produce examination-ready documentation — not just audit-passing artifacts.
Trusted by Major Cyber Insurance Carriers Brigient’s incident response team works directly with major Canadian and international cyber insurance carriers on financial sector incidents. When you hold a Brigient IR retainer, your insurer already knows us — removing friction at exactly the moment response speed matters most and helping to minimize claim costs.
The 4-Pillar Framework Maps Directly to B-13 Brigient’s Identify. Respond. Recover. Govern. framework is structurally aligned with OSFI B-13’s three domains. Building your cyber program with Brigient means building a program organized around regulatory expectations from day one — not a program that has to be retrofitted for compliance after the fact.
Based in Mississauga — Serving Ontario and Canada Brigient is headquartered in Mississauga, Ontario, giving GTA-based financial institutions access to on-site consultants and rapid response deployment. We serve financial institutions across Canada with remote and on-site engagement models.
Step 1 — Free Consultation (30 Minutes) A Brigient financial services security specialist reviews your current environment, regulatory obligations, and most pressing security gaps. No sales pressure. A candid conversation about where you stand and what the highest-priority actions are for your specific institution type.
Step 2 — Assessment and Roadmap Brigient conducts a structured assessment — OSFI B-13 gap analysis, IAM maturity review, asset visibility audit, or full risk assessment — and delivers a prioritized remediation roadmap with clear actions, timelines, and cost-effective resource requirements.
Step 3 — Program Execution and Ongoing Support Brigient executes against the roadmap as your security partner: implementing controls, building documentation, running simulations, preparing your team for regulatory examinations, and providing ongoing governance support with regular reporting to your leadership and board.
Canadian financial institutions cannot treat cybersecurity as a secondary concern. OSFI B-13 makes it a governance obligation. Your customers expect it. Your insurer is pricing it. And the threat actors targeting Canadian financial systems are counting on you to delay.
Brigient helps you move from exposure to confidence — with a structured methodology, proven regulatory alignment, and a team with real financial sector incident experience across Ontario and Canada.
Book a free 30-minute consultation with a Brigient financial services security specialist. No commitment. Clarity on where you stand and what to do next.
Serving banks, credit unions, fintechs, insurance firms, and wealth management organizations across Ontario and Canada. Headquartered in Mississauga, ON. Call 416-874-5662.
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