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I realize the article didn't say SFTP, but that couldn't be gathered from "secure FTP," as that's precisely what SFTP means?

SFTP is SSH File Transfer Protocol, and is actually its own protocol (not FTP over SSH).

There's also FTPS, which is FTP with TLS. That's closer to "secure FTP," but as @segmondy pointed out, this isn't what they use.

When I read it I thought the author was claiming plain FTP was secure too.

All of the banks I deal with use FTPS (which is called "secure" ftp). I have yet to deal with one that uses SFTP (ssh-ftp).

I understand the difference, yet the term "Secure FTP" is most often used to refer to SFTP and not FTPS, in my experience.

From wikipedia (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/File_Transfer_Protocol#Secure_F...) "The SSH file transfer protocol or secure FTP (SFTP)..."

Multiple google searches also yielded similar language.