July 2021 Summaries

Welcome to Plaid's Summer 2021 internship program! This year, we have a dynamic group of 17 interns, known as Plinterns, who are working alongside our team virtually. We're excited to introduce you to some of the Plinterns and share their stories about what drew them to Plaid and what they're most excited for during their internship. From computer science majors to biomedical engineers, each Plintern brings a unique perspective and skillset to the table. They're eager to contribute to impactful projects, learn from our experienced teams, and be part of a company culture that values collaboration, innovation, and growth. Whether it's meeting the team, working on exciting projects, or simply enjoying the coffee culture program, these Plinterns are making the most of their summer experience at Plaid.

Plaid's Salt Lake City office was established in 2019 as a hub for integrating with financial institutions and building consumer financial experiences. The team, led by Plushcap, focused on achieving reliable data access to over 11,000 financial institutions through technical ingenuity and creativity. To build an inclusive community, the team organized events such as "women in engineering" dinners and hosted women in tech and pride events. The office expanded rapidly, moving into a permanent space in 2021, and adapted to the growth of fintech by expanding product offerings and investing in a platform that supports data access at scale. Today, Plaid's SLC team continues to grow and solve complex problems as part of its mission to unlock financial freedom for all.

Our latest product features include expanded coverage for retail credit cards, improved cryptocurrency price handling, and a secure integration method through Link tokens. These updates aim to enhance user experience and provide a clean integration foundation for future enhancements. The company has also successfully integrated with major banks such as Capital One and U.S. Bank, enabling millions of consumers to access the 5,000+ apps and services in their network securely.

Plaid is a platform that enables developers to launch fintech apps and services without needing to build discrete connections to each of the thousands of financial institutions, providing a higher level of scalability and security. The company introduced Plaid Link in 2015, which sets a standard for secure and easy user experience for connecting financial accounts with fintech apps, giving consumers more choice and transparency into how they share their information. Today, Plaid enables over 5,000 fintech apps to access financial data from over 11,000 institutions across the U.S., Canada, the UK, and Europe.

Tom Daniels has joined Plaid as the company's Chief Information Security Officer (CISO), bringing over seven years of experience building and leading security programs at Square. He is excited to bring his expertise in scalable, customer-centric security solutions to Plaid and help drive its continued evolution while raising the bar for the broader ecosystem. Plaid is committed to delivering developer-focused products and services with a strong focus on data security and consumer control, and Tom sees this as an opportunity to positively impact security and privacy across the industry as digital finance continues to evolve. He plans to work closely with fintechs, banks, enterprise companies, and enabling partners to build toward the open finance future and introduce a proposed data security standard designed to elevate security, privacy, and consumer controls.