Federal Banking Agencies Consider Joint ANPR to Address Cybersecurity Standards

Federal Issues FDIC Banking Federal Reserve OCC Agency Rule-Making & Guidance Privacy/Cyber Risk & Data Security Vendor Management

On October 19, the FDIC, the OCC, and the Federal Reserve, issued an Advanced Notice of Proposed Rulemaking (ANPR) to further the “development of enhanced cyber risk management standards for the largest and most interconnected entities under their respective supervisory jurisdictions, and those entities’ service providers.” These standards, according to the ANPR, are intended to “increase the operational resilience” of supervised entities and their service providers and, based on the interconnectedness of these entities, “reduce the impact on the financial system in case of a cyber event experienced by one of these entities.” The ANPR proposes organizing enhanced cyber standards into the following categories: (i) cyber risk governance; (ii) cyber risk management; (iii) internal dependency management; (iv) external dependency management; and (v) incident response. The ANPR further explains that the banking agencies “are considering implementing the enhanced standards in a tiered manner, imposing more stringent standards on the systems of those entities that are critical to the functioning of the financial sector.” Comments on the ANPR, which would not apply to community banks, are due January 17, 2017.