How can legal leaders work with IT and cybersecurity experts to better protect financial institutions from cyber threats and prevent the kind of panic that occurred during the failure of Silicon Valley Bank and Signature Bank?

Recognizing that they are legal leaders and not cybersecurity or IT leaders.

The second part of the question has nothing to do with security.

As to the first part of the question, management needs to ensure that the information security team is adequately staffed with trained people and has the necessary budgets. 

 

Admittedly I have not read every report that is out there on the failure of SVB and Signature Bank, but my understanding was that the failure was caused more by market conditions and risky business practices, not anything to do with cybersecurity.

To answer the first part of the question though, it’s important for legal, IT, cybersecurity, and others to work together to understand the regulations and compliance needs, which legal often understands more completely - especially the nuances of legalese, and then IT/CS can recommend tools, practices, policies, and procedures that might be required from their standpoint to meet those.