Her stamina of the systemic ones banks her Eurozone in order to cope with cyber attacks will be evaluated by the European Central Bank (ECB).

As announced today by the ECB, in 2024 it will submit 109 banks under its direct supervision to an exercise of extreme situation simulation, the so-called stress tests, regarding their resilience against cyber threats. This exercise will assess how banks deal with and recover from a cyber attack rather than their ability to prevent it.

According to the scenario of this exercise, the cyber attack will succeed in disrupting the daily operations of the banks. Banks will test the measures they have in place to deal with a cyber-attack and to restore their operations, including by activating contingency procedures and contingency plans and restoring their normal working conditions. Supervisors will then assess the extent to which banks can cope with such a scenario.

As part of the exercise, 28 banks will undergo an enhanced assessment to provide additional information on how they dealt with the cyber attack. This sample covers different business models and geographical areas in order to meaningfully capture the euro area banking system and to ensure effective coordination with other supervisory activities.

The data gathered will be used for the wide-ranging supervisory review to be carried out in 2024. Supervisors will discuss the findings and relevant lessons learned with each bank as part of the Supervisory Review and Evaluation Process (SREP). of 2024, which assesses the risk profile of each bank. The main findings of the exercise will be announced in the summer of 2024.