81_FR_74522 81 FR 74315 - Enhanced Cyber Risk Management Standards

81 FR 74315 - Enhanced Cyber Risk Management Standards

DEPARTMENT OF THE TREASURY
Office of the Comptroller of the Currency
FEDERAL RESERVE SYSTEM
FEDERAL DEPOSIT INSURANCE CORPORATION

Federal Register Volume 81, Issue 207 (October 26, 2016)

Page Range74315-74326
FR Document2016-25871

The Board of Governors of the Federal Reserve System (Board), the Office of the Comptroller of the Currency (OCC), and the Federal Deposit Insurance Corporation (FDIC) (collectively, the agencies) are inviting comment on an advance notice of proposed rulemaking (ANPR) regarding enhanced cyber risk management standards (enhanced standards) for large and interconnected entities under their supervision and those entities' service providers. The agencies are considering establishing enhanced standards to increase the operational resilience of these entities and reduce the impact on the financial system in case of a cyber event experienced by one of these entities. The ANPR addresses five categories of cyber standards: Cyber risk governance; cyber risk management; internal dependency management; external dependency management; and incident response, cyber resilience, and situational awareness. The 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.

Federal Register, Volume 81 Issue 207 (Wednesday, October 26, 2016)
[Federal Register Volume 81, Number 207 (Wednesday, October 26, 2016)]
[Proposed Rules]
[Pages 74315-74326]
From the Federal Register Online  [www.thefederalregister.org]
[FR Doc No: 2016-25871]


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Proposed Rules
                                                Federal Register
________________________________________________________________________

This section of the FEDERAL REGISTER contains notices to the public of 
the proposed issuance of rules and regulations. The purpose of these 
notices is to give interested persons an opportunity to participate in 
the rule making prior to the adoption of the final rules.

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Federal Register / Vol. 81, No. 207 / Wednesday, October 26, 2016 / 
Proposed Rules

[[Page 74315]]


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DEPARTMENT OF THE TREASURY

Office of the Comptroller of the Currency

12 CFR Part 30

[Docket ID OCC-2016-0016]
RIN 1557-AE06

FEDERAL RESERVE SYSTEM

12 CFR Chapter II

[Docket No. R-1550]
RIN 7100-AE 61

FEDERAL DEPOSIT INSURANCE CORPORATION

12 CFR Part 364

RIN 3064-AE45


Enhanced Cyber Risk Management Standards

AGENCY: The Board of Governors of the Federal Reserve System; the 
Office of the Comptroller of the Currency; and the Federal Deposit 
Insurance Corporation.

ACTION: Joint advance notice of proposed rulemaking.

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SUMMARY: The Board of Governors of the Federal Reserve System (Board), 
the Office of the Comptroller of the Currency (OCC), and the Federal 
Deposit Insurance Corporation (FDIC) (collectively, the agencies) are 
inviting comment on an advance notice of proposed rulemaking (ANPR) 
regarding enhanced cyber risk management standards (enhanced standards) 
for large and interconnected entities under their supervision and those 
entities' service providers. The agencies are considering establishing 
enhanced standards to increase the operational resilience of these 
entities and reduce the impact on the financial system in case of a 
cyber event experienced by one of these entities. The ANPR addresses 
five categories of cyber standards: Cyber risk governance; cyber risk 
management; internal dependency management; external dependency 
management; and incident response, cyber resilience, and situational 
awareness. The 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.

DATES: Comments must be received by January 17, 2017.

ADDRESSES: Comments should be directed to:
    Board: When submitting comments, please consider submitting your 
comments by email or fax because paper mail in the Washington, DC area 
and at the Board may be subject to delay. You may submit comments, 
identified by Docket No. R-1550 and RIN 7100-AE-61 by any of the 
following methods:
     Agency Web site: http://www.federalreserve.gov. Follow the 
instructions for submitting comments at http://www.federalreserve.gov/generalinfo/foia/ProposedRegs.cfm.
     Federal eRulemaking Portal: http://www.regulations.gov. 
Follow the instructions for submitting comments.
     Email: [email protected]. Include docket 
and RIN numbers in the subject line of the message.
     FAX: (202) 452-3819 or (202) 452-3102.
    Mail: Robert deV. Frierson, Secretary, Board of Governors of the 
Federal Reserve System, 20th Street and Constitution Avenue NW., 
Washington, DC 20551.
    All public comments will be made available on the Board's Web site 
at http://www.federalreserve.gov/generalinfo/foia/ProposedRegs.cfm as 
submitted, unless modified for technical reasons. Accordingly, your 
comments will not be edited to remove any identifying or contact 
information. Public comments may also be viewed electronically or in 
paper form in Room 3515, 1801 K Street NW. (between 18th and 19th 
Streets NW.), Washington, DC 20006 between 9:00 a.m. and 5:00 p.m. on 
weekdays. For security reasons, the Board requires that visitors make 
an appointment to inspect comments. You may do so by calling (202) 452-
3684. Upon arrival, visitors will be required to present valid 
government-issued photo identification and to submit to security 
screening in order to inspect and photocopy comments.
    OCC: Because paper mail in the Washington, DC area and at the OCC 
is subject to delay, commenters are encouraged to submit comments 
through the Federal eRulemaking Portal or email, if possible. Please 
use the title ``Enhanced Cyber Risk Management Standards'' to 
facilitate the organization and distribution of the comments. You may 
submit comments by any of the following methods:
     Federal eRulemaking Portal--``Regulations.gov'': Go to 
www.regulations.gov. Enter ``Docket ID OCC-2016-0016'' in the Search 
Box and click ``Search.'' Click on ``Comment Now'' to submit public 
comments.
     Click on the ``Help'' tab on the Regulations.gov home page 
to get information on using Regulations.gov, including instructions for 
submitting public comments.
     Email: [email protected].
     Mail: Legislative and Regulatory Activities Division, 
Office of the Comptroller of the Currency, 400 7th Street SW., Suite 
3E-218, mail stop 9W-11, Washington, DC 20219.
     Hand Delivery/Courier: 400 7th Street SW., Suite 3E-218, 
mail stop 9W-11, Washington, DC 20219.
     Fax: (571) 465-4326.
    Instructions: You must include ``OCC'' as the agency name and 
``Docket ID OCC-2016-0016'' in your comment. In general, OCC will enter 
all comments received into the docket and publish them on the 
Regulations.gov Web site without change, including any business or 
personal information that you provide such as name and address 
information, email addresses, or phone numbers. Comments received, 
including attachments and other supporting materials, are part of the 
public record and subject to public disclosure. Do not enclose any 
information in your comment or supporting materials that you consider 
confidential or inappropriate for public disclosure.
    You may review comments and other related materials that pertain to 
this rulemaking action by any of the following methods:
     Viewing Comments Electronically: Go to 
www.regulations.gov. Enter ``Docket ID OCC-2016-0016'' in the Search 
box and click ``Search.'' Click on ``Open Docket Folder'' on the right 
side of the screen and then ``Comments.'' Comments can be filtered by 
clicking on

[[Page 74316]]

``View All'' and then using the filtering tools on the left side of the 
screen.
     Click on the ``Help'' tab on the Regulations.gov home page 
to get information on using Regulations.gov. Supporting materials may 
be viewed by clicking on ``Open Docket Folder'' and then clicking on 
``Supporting Documents.'' The docket may be viewed after the close of 
the comment period in the same manner as during the comment period.
     Viewing Comments Personally: You may personally inspect 
and photocopy comments at the OCC, 400 7th Street SW., Washington, DC 
20219. For security reasons, the OCC requires that visitors make an 
appointment to inspect comments. You may do so by calling (202) 649-
6700 or, for persons who are deaf or hard of hearing, TTY, (202) 649-
5597. Upon arrival, visitors will be required to present valid 
government-issued photo identification and to submit to security 
screening in order to inspect and photocopy comments.
    FDIC: You may submit comments, identified by RIN 3064-AE45, by any 
of the following methods:
    Agency Web site: http://www.fdic.gov/regulations/laws/federal/propose.html. Follow instructions for submitting comments on the Agency 
Web site.
     Email: [email protected]. Include the RIN 3064-AE45 on the 
subject line of the message.
     Mail: Robert E. Feldman, Executive Secretary, Attention: 
Comments, Federal Deposit Insurance Corporation, 550 17th Street NW., 
Washington, DC 20429.
     Hand Delivery: Comments may be hand delivered to the guard 
station at the rear of the 550 17th Street Building (located on F 
Street) on business days between 7:00 a.m. and 5:00 p.m.
    Public Inspection: All comments received must include the agency 
name and RIN 3064-AE45 for this rulemaking. All comments received will 
be posted without change to http://www.fdic.gov/regulations/laws/federal/propose.html, including any personal information provided. 
Paper copies of public comments may be ordered from the FDIC Public 
Information Center, 3501 North Fairfax Drive, Room E-1002, Arlington, 
VA 22226 by telephone at (877) 275-3342 or (703) 562-2200.

FOR FURTHER INFORMATION CONTACT: 
    Board: Anna Lee Hewko, Associate Director, (202) 530-6260; or 
Matthew Hayduk, Manager, (202) 973-6190; or Julia Philipp, Senior 
Supervisory Financial Analyst, (202) 452-3940; or Christopher Olson, 
Senior Supervisory Financial Analyst, (202) 912-4609, Division of 
Banking Supervision and Regulation; or Benjamin W. McDonough, Special 
Counsel, (202) 452-2036; or Claudia Von Pervieux, Counsel, (202) 452-
2552; or Michelle Kidd, Counsel, (202) 736-5554, Legal Division; for 
persons who are deaf or hard of hearing, TTY (202) 263-4869.
    OCC: Bethany Dugan, Deputy Comptroller for Operational Risk, (202) 
649-6949; or Kevin Greenfield, Director, Bank Information Technology, 
(202) 649-6954; or Eric Gott, Risk Team Lead for Governance and 
Operational Risk, Large Bank Supervision, (202) 649-7181; or Patrick 
Kelly, Bank Examiner, Critical Infrastructure Protection, (202) 649-
5519; or Carl Kaminski, Special Counsel, Beth Knickerbocker, Counsel, 
or Rima Kundnani, Attorney, Legislative and Regulatory Activities 
Division, (202) 649-5490, Office of the Comptroller of the Currency, 
400 7th Street SW., Washington, DC 20219.
    FDIC: Donald Saxinger, Senior Examination Specialist, IT 
Supervision Branch, Division of Risk Management Supervision, (703) 254-
0214; or John Dorsey, Counsel, (202) 898-3807. Supervision & 
Legislation Branch, Legal Division.

I. Background

    With advances in financial technology, financial institutions and 
consumers alike have become increasingly dependent on technology to 
facilitate financial transactions. In addition, the largest, most 
complex financial institutions rely heavily on technology to engage in 
national and international banking activities and to provide critical 
services to the financial sector and the U.S. economy.
    As technology dependence in the financial sector continues to grow, 
so do opportunities for high-impact technology failures and cyber-
attacks. Due to the interconnectedness of the U.S. financial system, a 
cyber incident or failure at one interconnected entity may not only 
impact the safety and soundness of the entity, but also other financial 
entities with potentially systemic consequences. For example, 
depository institutions and depository institution holding companies 
play an important role in U.S. payment, clearing, and settlement 
arrangements and provide access to credit for businesses and 
households. Nonbank financial companies that the Financial Stability 
Oversight Council (FSOC) has determined should be supervised by the 
Board (referred to in the ANPR as nonbank financial companies) perform 
critical functions for the U.S. financial system, and financial market 
infrastructures (FMIs) facilitate the payment, clearing, and recording 
of monetary and other financial transactions and services and play 
critical roles in fostering financial stability in the United States. 
Third parties that provide payments processing, core banking, and other 
financial technology services to these participants in the financial 
sector also provide services that are vital to the financial sector.
    The Board, the OCC, and the FDIC have incorporated information 
security into their supervisory review of information technology (IT) 
programs at supervised banking organizations for many years. The 
agencies also review the services of third-party service providers that 
support those entities, and the Board includes information security as 
part of the supervisory program for nonbank financial companies and 
FMIs.
    In response to expanding cyber risks, the agencies are considering 
establishing enhanced standards for the largest and most interconnected 
entities under their supervision, as well as for services that these 
entities receive from third parties. The term ``covered entities'' is 
used throughout this document to refer to entities potentially covered 
by the standards described in this ANPR. The enhanced standards would 
be designed to increase covered entities' operational resilience and 
reduce the potential impact on the financial system in the event of a 
failure, cyber-attack, or the failure to implement appropriate cyber 
risk management.
    The agencies are considering implementing the enhanced standards in 
a tiered manner, imposing more stringent standards on the systems of 
covered entities that are critical to the functioning of the financial 
sector, referred to in this ANPR as ``sector-critical systems.''
    The agencies are seeking comment on all aspects of the enhanced 
standards described in this ANPR. The agencies plan to use information 
collected in this ANPR to develop a more detailed proposal for 
consideration. The agencies will again invite public comment on a 
detailed proposal before adopting any final rule.

II. Relationship to Existing Requirements and Guidance

a. Existing Supervisory Programs

    As noted, the agencies have existing supervisory programs that 
contain general expectations for cybersecurity practices at financial 
institutions and third-party service providers. The enhanced standards 
would be integrated into the existing supervisory framework by 
establishing enhanced supervisory

[[Page 74317]]

expectations for the entities and services that potentially pose 
heightened cyber risk to the safety and soundness of the financial 
sector.
    Through the Federal Financial Institutions Examination Council 
(FFIEC), the agencies issued the Uniform Rating System for Information 
Technology (URSIT) in 1978 (revised January 20, 1999).\1\ The URSIT 
rating is used by federal and state regulators to uniformly assess IT 
risks at financial institutions, their affiliates, and service 
providers \2\ for the purpose of identifying those institutions that 
require special supervisory attention. The URSIT framework includes 
elements to assess data security and other risk management factors 
necessary to determine the quality, integrity, and reliability of the 
financial institution's or third-party service provider's IT. The 
proposed enhanced standards would not replace the URSIT ratings but 
could be used, in part, to inform the cyber-related elements of the 
URSIT rating for covered entities. For example, supervisory work 
related to the proposed external dependency management standard 
discussed in this ANPR could be used, in part, to inform the 
development and acquisition component of the URSIT rating.
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    \1\ 64 FR 3109, January 20, 1999.
    \2\ The agencies have statutory authority to supervise and 
examine services provided by third-party service providers to 
regulated financial institutions under the Bank Service Company Act 
(12 U.S.C. 1867(c)).
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    In 2003, the FFIEC published the first in a series of booklets on 
IT that make up the IT Handbook. The IT Handbook provides guidance to 
examiners in reviewing financial institutions and services provided by 
third parties. Certain booklets, such as the Business Continuity 
Planning booklet and the Information Security booklet, incorporate the 
agencies' expectations regarding cybersecurity risk management. The IT 
Handbook also includes work programs that an examiner may use to aid in 
assessing a company's URSIT rating. IT Handbook guidance would continue 
to be used for covered entities to assess IT risk management.
    In 1999, Title V, Subtitle A of the Gramm-Leach-Bliley Act (GLBA) 
\3\ required that each agency establish appropriate administrative, 
technical, and physical controls for the safeguarding of financial 
institutions' customer information. In 2000, the agencies published the 
Interagency Guidelines Establishing Information Security Standards 
(Guidelines) implementing the GLBA safeguarding requirements.\4\ The 
Guidelines require insured depository institutions to implement 
information security programs to ensure the security and 
confidentiality of customer information; protect against any 
anticipated threats or hazards to the security or integrity of such 
information; protect against unauthorized access to or use of such 
information that could result in substantial harm or inconvenience to 
any customer; and ensure the proper disposal of customer and consumer 
information.
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    \3\ 15 U.S.C. 6801-6809.
    \4\ See 12 CFR part 208, App. D-2 and 12 CFR part 225, App. F 
(Board); 12 CFR 30, App. B (OCC); and 12 CFR part 364, App. B and 12 
CFR part 391, subpart B, App. B (FDIC).
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    Additionally, the agencies have interagency guidelines that 
establish safety and soundness standards, including operational and 
managerial standards, for depository institutions.\5\ These guidelines 
require an insured depository institution to have internal controls and 
information systems appropriate to the size of the institution and to 
the nature, scope, and risk of its activities and that provide for, 
among other requirements, effective risk assessment and adequate 
procedures to safeguard and manage assets. Insured depository 
institutions are also required to have internal audit systems based on 
the same criteria that provide for adequate testing and review of 
information systems. The Guidelines and safety and soundness standards 
would continue to apply to covered entities that are insured depository 
institutions.
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    \5\ See 12 CFR part 30, App. A and D, 12 CFR part 208, App. D-1, 
12 CFR part 225, App. F.
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b. FFIEC Cybersecurity Assessment Tool

    In June 2015, the FFIEC issued the Cybersecurity Assessment Tool 
(Assessment) as a voluntary self-assessment tool that financial 
institutions, including covered entities, may use to help assess their 
cyber risks and determine their cybersecurity preparedness.
    The Assessment provides institutions with a repeatable and 
measurable process to determine whether the institutions have 
appropriate controls and risk management in place relative to the 
inherent risk profile of the institution. The Assessment incorporates 
baseline cybersecurity-related categories from the FFIEC IT Handbook, 
as well as key concepts from the National Institute of Standards and 
Technology (NIST) Cybersecurity Framework (CSF) and other industry best 
practices. However, the Assessment does not establish binding minimum 
standards.

c. NIST Cybersecurity Framework

    The NIST CSF is a voluntary framework for organizations to better 
understand, manage, and reduce their cybersecurity risk. The CSF is 
intended to be customized by different business sectors and individual 
organizations to best suit their risks, situation, and needs. It was 
also designed to improve communications, awareness, and understanding 
among IT, planning and operating units, and senior executives, to 
better address cyber risks. The NIST CSF Core consists of five 
concurrent and continuous functions: Identify, Protect, Detect, 
Respond, and Recover. Taken together, these functions provide a high-
level, strategic view of the lifecycle of an organization's management 
of cybersecurity risk.
    Similar to the NIST CSF, the enhanced standards would provide a 
clear set of objectives for sound cyber risk management. However, the 
binding requirements set forth in the enhanced standards would be 
designed specifically to address the cyber risks of the largest, most 
interconnected U.S. financial entities.

d. CPMI-IOSCO Guidance

    In June 2016, the Committee on Payments and Market Infrastructures 
(CPMI) and the Board of the International Organization of Securities 
Commissions (IOSCO) released ``Guidance on cyber resilience for 
financial market infrastructures.'' \6\ According to CPMI and IOSCO, 
the guidance ``aims to add momentum to and instill international 
consistency in the industry's ongoing efforts to enhance FMIs' ability 
to preempt cyber-attacks, respond rapidly and effectively to them, and 
achieve faster and safer target recovery objectives if they succeed.'' 
\7\ The guidance is intended to supplement the CPMI-IOSCO Principles 
for Financial Market Infrastructures (PFMI) and is ``not intended to 
impose additional standards on FMIs beyond those set out in the PFMI, 
but provides detail related to the preparations and measures that FMIs 
should undertake to enhance their cyber resilience capabilities with 
the objective of limiting the escalating risks that cyber threats pose 
to financial stability.'' \8\ The agencies reviewed the CPMI-IOSCO 
guidance and took it into consideration as they developed the proposed 
enhanced standards described in this ANPR.
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    \6\ See http://www.bis.org/cpmi/publ/d146.pdf.
    \7\ See http://www.bis.org/cpmi/publ/d146.htm.
    \8\ See http://www.bis.org/cpmi/publ/d146.pdf.

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e. Interagency Paper on Sound Practices To Strengthen the Resilience of 
the U.S. Financial System

    In April 2003, the Board, the OCC, and the Securities and Exchange 
Commission issued the Interagency Paper on Sound Practices to 
Strengthen the Resilience of the U.S. Financial System (Sound Practices 
Paper).\9\ The Sound Practices Paper focuses on minimizing the 
immediate systemic effects of a wide-scale disruption on critical 
financial markets and on establishing the appropriate back-up capacity 
for recovery and resumption of clearance and settlement activities in 
wholesale financial markets. As discussed in sections IV and VI, the 
agencies took the Sound Practices Paper into consideration as they 
developed the proposed enhanced standards described in this ANPR.
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    \9\ Available at: http://www.sec.gov/news/studies/34-47638.htm.
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III. Scope of Application

    The agencies are considering applying the enhanced standards to 
certain entities with total consolidated assets of $50 billion or more 
on an enterprise-wide basis. A cyber-attack or disruption at one or 
more of these entities could have a significant impact on the safety 
and soundness of the entity, other financial entities, and the U.S. 
financial sector. The agencies are considering applying the enhanced 
standards to these entities on an enterprise-wide basis because cyber 
risks in one part of an organization could expose other parts of the 
organization to harm.
    Each agency would apply these standards to large institutions 
subject to their jurisdiction.\10\ Thus, the Board is considering 
applying the enhanced standards on an enterprise-wide basis to all U.S. 
bank holding companies with total consolidated assets of $50 billion or 
more, the U.S. operations of foreign banking organizations with total 
U.S. assets of $50 billion or more, and all U.S. savings and loan 
holding companies with total consolidated assets of $50 billion or 
more.\11\ In this regard, the proposed standards would apply to 
subsidiaries of depository institution holding companies (other than 
depository institutions supervised by the OCC and FDIC) in view of the 
subsidiaries' potential to act as points of cyber vulnerability to the 
covered entities. The Board is also considering applying the standards 
to nonbank financial companies supervised by the Board pursuant to 
section 165 of the Dodd-Frank Wall Street Reform and Consumer 
Protection Act (Dodd-Frank Act), which directs the Board to establish 
enhanced prudential standards, including overall risk management 
standards, for these entities.\12\ Similarly, the Board is considering 
applying the standards to financial market utilities designated by FSOC 
(designated FMUs) for which the Board is the Supervisory Agency 
pursuant to sections 805 and 810 of the Dodd-Frank Act; other FMIs over 
which the Board has primary (not backup) supervisory authority because 
the FMIs are members of the Federal Reserve System; and FMIs that are 
operated by the Federal Reserve Banks (collectively referred to as 
``Board-supervised FMIs'').\13\
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    \10\ 12 U.S.C. 321, 1818, 1831p-1 (Board); 12 U.S.C. 1, 93a, 
161, 481, 1463, 1464, 1818, 1831p-1, 3901, 3909 (OCC); 12 U.S.C. 
1818, 1819, 1831p-1 (FDIC).
    \11\ 12 U.S.C. 1467a(g), 5365.
    \12\ 12 U.S.C. 5365.
    \13\ 12 U.S.C. 5464(a), 5469; 12 U.S.C. 330, 1818, 1831a; 12 
U.S.C. 248(j).
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    The OCC is considering applying the standards to any national bank, 
federal savings association (and any subsidiaries thereof), or federal 
branch of a foreign bank that is a subsidiary of a bank holding company 
or savings and loan holding company with total consolidated assets of 
$50 billion or more, or any national bank, federal savings association, 
or federal branch of a foreign bank that has total consolidated assets 
of $50 billion or more that does not have a parent holding company. The 
Board is considering applying the standards to any state member bank 
(and any subsidiaries thereof) that is a subsidiary of a bank holding 
company with total consolidated assets of $50 billion or more, and to 
any state member bank that has total consolidated assets of $50 billion 
or more that is not a subsidiary of a bank holding company. The FDIC is 
considering applying the standards to any state nonmember bank or state 
savings association (and any subsidiaries thereof) that is a subsidiary 
of a bank holding company or savings and loan holding company with 
total consolidated assets of $50 billion or more. Additionally, the 
FDIC is considering applying the standards to any state nonmember bank 
or state savings association that has total consolidated assets of $50 
billion or more that does not have a parent holding company.
    As noted, the agencies are considering whether to apply the 
standards to third-party service providers with respect to services 
provided to depository institutions and their affiliates that are 
covered entities (covered services). This would ensure consistent, 
direct application of the standards regardless of whether a depository 
institution or its affiliate conducted the operation itself, or whether 
it engaged a third-party service provider to conduct the operation. 
Direct application of the standards to these service providers could 
have potential benefits, including facilitating supervisory action in 
the event that a covered service was not meeting a proposed standard 
and establishing an obligation for meeting the standard on the 
depository institution or its affiliate, as well as on the third-party 
provider of the covered service. The Board also is considering 
requiring nonbank financial companies and Board-supervised FMIs to 
verify that any services the nonbank financial company or Board-
supervised FMI receives from third parties are subject to the same 
standards that would apply if the services were being conducted by the 
nonbank financial company or Board-supervised FMI itself.
    Other financial entities, including community banks that are not 
covered entities, would continue to be subject to existing guidance, 
standards, and examinations related to the provision of banking 
services by third parties.
Questions on the Scope of Application
    1. How should the agencies consider broadening or narrowing the 
scope of entities to which the proposed standards would apply? What, if 
any, alternative size thresholds or measures of risk to the safety and 
soundness of the financial sector and the U.S. economy should the 
agencies consider in determining the scope of application of the 
standards? For example, should ``covered entity'' be defined according 
to the number of connections an entity (including its service 
providers) has to other entities in the financial sector, rather than 
asset size? If so, how should the agencies define ``connections'' for 
this purpose?
    2. What are the costs and benefits of applying the standards to 
covered entities on an enterprise-wide basis? If the agencies were to 
consider exempting certain subsidiaries within a covered entity from 
the standards, what criteria should be used to assess any such 
exemptions? What safeguards should the agencies require from a 
subsidiary seeking to be exempted from the standards to ensure that an 
exempted subsidiary does not expose the covered entity to material 
cyber risk?
    3. What, if any, special considerations should be made regarding 
application of the standards to savings and loan holding companies that 
engage significantly in insurance or commercial activities?

[[Page 74319]]

    4. What are the most effective ways to ensure that services 
provided by third-party service providers to covered entities are 
performed in such a manner as to minimize cyber risk? What are the 
advantages and disadvantages of applying the standards to services by 
requiring covered entities to maintain appropriate service agreements 
or otherwise receive services only from third-party service providers 
that meet the standards with regard to the services provided, rather 
than applying the requirements directly to third-party service 
providers?
    5. What are the advantages and disadvantages of applying the 
standards directly to service providers to covered entities? What 
challenges would such an approach pose?
    6. What factors are most important in determining an appropriate 
balance between protecting the safety and soundness of the financial 
sector through the possible application of the standards and the 
implementation burden and costs associated with implementing the 
standards?

IV. Sector-Critical Systems

    The financial sector operates through a network of interrelated 
markets and financial participants. As a result, a technology failure 
or cyber-attack at one covered entity could have wide-ranging effects 
on the safety and soundness of other financial entities, both within 
and outside the United States. While this interconnectedness warrants 
comprehensive cyber risk management by all financial market 
participants, it is especially important in the case of covered 
entities with sector-critical systems.
    Thus, the agencies are considering establishing a two-tiered 
approach, with the enhanced standards applying to all systems of 
covered entities, and an additional, higher set of expectations, 
referred to in the ANPR as ``sector-critical standards,'' applying to 
those systems of covered entities that are critical to the financial 
sector.
    As discussed below in the ANPR, the agencies are proposing sector-
critical standards in four of the five categories of standards that 
would require covered entities with sector-critical systems to 
substantially mitigate the risk of a disruption due to a cyber event to 
their sector-critical systems.
    Previously in the Sound Practices Paper, the Board and the OCC, 
together with the Securities and Exchange Commission, introduced 
definitions of ``critical financial markets'' and ``firms that play 
significant roles in critical financial markets,'' which emphasized the 
need to protect the most critical elements of the financial system from 
serious new risks posed in the post-September 11 environment. In the 
Sound Practices Paper, ``critical financial markets'' are defined as 
the markets for federal funds, foreign exchange, and commercial paper; 
U.S. Government and agency securities; and corporate debt and equity 
securities. The Sound Practices Paper further provides: ``firms that 
play significant roles in critical financial markets are those that 
participate (on behalf of themselves or their customers) with 
sufficient market share in one or more critical financial markets such 
that their failure to settle their own or their customers' material 
pending transactions by the end of the business day could present 
systemic risk. While there are different ways to gauge the significance 
of such firms in critical markets, as a guideline, the agencies 
consider a firm significant in a particular critical market if it 
consistently clears or settles at least five percent of the value of 
transactions in that critical market.''
    While the scope of the Sound Practices Paper was limited to the 
resumption of clearance and settlement activities in wholesale 
financial markets, the definitions presented in the Sound Practices 
Paper provide a starting point for identifying systems (that is, 
sector-critical systems) that should be subject to the more stringent, 
sector-critical standards. Thus, consistent with the Sound Practices 
Paper, the agencies are considering whether systems that support the 
clearing or settlement of at least five percent of the value of 
transactions (on a consistent basis) in one or more of the markets for 
federal funds, foreign exchange, commercial paper, U.S. Government and 
agency securities, and corporate debt and equity securities, should be 
considered sector-critical systems for the purpose of the sector-
critical standards. The agencies also are considering whether systems 
that support the clearing or settlement of at least five percent of the 
value of transactions (on a consistent basis) in other markets (for 
example, exchange-traded and over-the-counter derivatives), or that 
support the maintenance of a significant share (for example, five 
percent) of the total U.S. deposits or balances due from other 
depository institutions in the United States, should be considered 
sector-critical systems.
    Because a cyber event may impact the safety and soundness of 
multiple financial participants and create systemic risk beyond these 
specific markets, the agencies are considering additional factors to 
identify sector-critical systems, such as substitutability and 
interconnectedness. Systems that provide key functionality to the 
financial sector for which alternatives are limited or nonexistent, or 
would take excessive time to implement (for example, due to 
incompatibility) also could have a material impact on financial 
stability if significantly disrupted. Systems that act as key nodes to 
the financial sector due to their extensive interconnectedness to other 
financial entities could have a material impact on financial stability 
if significantly disrupted.
    Consistent with the approach to other services, any services 
provided by third parties that support a covered entity's sector-
critical systems would be subject to the same sector-critical 
standards.
Questions on Sector-Critical Systems
    7. Do covered entities currently have access to sufficient 
information to determine whether any of their systems would be 
considered sector-critical systems for the purpose of the standards? If 
not, what additional information would be necessary for an entity to 
identify whether it has one or more sector-critical systems for the 
purposes of the standards?
    8. What are the advantages and disadvantages of requiring covered 
entities to identify and report to the agencies their systems that 
support operations and meet the applicable thresholds to be considered 
sector-critical systems? Alternatively, what are the advantages and 
disadvantages of having the agencies develop a process to identify the 
systems of covered entities that support operations and meet the 
applicable thresholds to be considered sector-critical systems and to 
notify covered entities which of their systems would be subject to the 
sector-critical standards?
    9. What thresholds for transaction value in one or more critical 
financial markets should the agencies consider for identifying sector-
critical systems? Similarly, what, if any, additional thresholds should 
the agencies consider for identifying sector-critical systems that 
could have a material impact on financial stability if disrupted? For 
example, how should the agencies identify systems that provide 
functionality to the financial sector and for which alternatives are 
limited, nonexistent, or would take excessive time to implement? How 
should such factors be weighted? Commenters are encouraged to provide 
quantitative as well as qualitative support and analysis for proposed 
alternative methodologies, thresholds and/or factors.

[[Page 74320]]

    10. What are the advantages and disadvantages of determining that a 
covered entity which holds a substantial amount of U.S. deposits and/or 
balances due from other depository institutions in the United States 
plays a significant role in a critical financial market? At what level 
of activity should a covered entity's systems related to holding U.S. 
deposits and/or balances due from other depository institutions in the 
United States be determined to be critical to the sector?
    11. What factors should the agencies consider in a measure of 
interconnectedness resulting in a system being determined as critical 
to the financial sector, and how should such factors be weighted? 
Commenters are asked to provide quantitative as well as qualitative 
support and analysis for proposed alternative methodologies, thresholds 
and/or factors.
    12. In some cases, entities, such as smaller banking organizations, 
may provide services considered sector-critical services either 
directly to the financial sector or through covered entities. What 
criteria should the agencies use to evaluate whether a financial entity 
that would not otherwise be subject to the enhanced standards should be 
subject to the sector-critical standards? How should the agencies weigh 
the costs of imposing the sector-critical standards to such smaller 
banking organizations against the potential benefits to the financial 
system?

V. Enhanced Cyber Risk Management Standards

    As noted, the agencies are considering enhanced cyber risk 
management standards for covered entities to increase the entities' 
operational resilience and reduce the potential impact on the financial 
system as a result of, for example, a cyber-attack at a firm or the 
failure to implement appropriate cyber risk management.
    The enhanced standards would emphasize the need for covered 
entities to demonstrate effective cyber risk governance; continuously 
monitor and manage their cyber risk within the risk appetite and 
tolerance levels approved by their boards of directors; \14\ establish 
and implement strategies for cyber resilience and business continuity 
in the event of a disruption; establish protocols for secure, 
immutable, transferable storage of critical records; and maintain 
continuing situational awareness of their operational status and 
cybersecurity posture on an enterprise-wide basis. The agencies are 
considering establishing a two-tiered approach, with the proposed 
enhanced standards applying to all systems of covered entities and an 
additional, higher set of expectations, or ``sector-critical 
standards,'' applying to those systems of covered entities that are 
critical to the financial sector. The ``sector-critical standards'' 
would require covered entities to substantially mitigate the risk of a 
disruption due to a cyber event to their sector-critical systems.
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    \14\ With regard to providers of services, depending on the size 
and structure of the organization and the relative size of the unit 
providing services to a depository institution, its subsidiaries or 
affiliates, it may be appropriate for some functions to be performed 
by business line executive management instead of the board of 
directors or a board committee of the organization. For these firms, 
``enterprise-wide,'' for purposes of the ANPR, encompasses the 
governance processes, policies, procedures, and controls related to 
or impacting the performance of services by a third party for a 
depository institution, its subsidiaries, or affiliates.
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    As noted, the standards would be organized into five categories:
    Category 1: Cyber risk governance;
    Category 2: Cyber risk management;
    Category 3: Internal dependency management;
    Category 4: External dependency management; and
    Category 5: Incident response, cyber resilience, and situational 
awareness.
    The term ``internal dependency'' in this ANPR refers to the 
business assets (i.e., workforce, data, technology, and facilities) of 
a covered entity upon which such entity depends to deliver services, as 
well as the information flows and interconnections among those assets. 
The term ``external dependency'' refers to an entity's relationships 
with outside vendors, suppliers, customers, utilities (such as power 
and telecommunications), and other external organizations and service 
providers that the covered entity depends on to deliver services, as 
well as the information flows and interconnections between the entity 
and those external parties.
    The categories are organized in this order to emphasize the core 
cyber risk governance and cyber risk management standards the agencies 
would expect a covered entity to develop to establish a foundation for 
making informed risk-based decisions in support of its business 
objectives. Standards in the internal dependency management, external 
dependency management, and incident response, cyber resilience, and 
situational awareness categories are designed to work together and to 
be mutually reinforcing.
    In the discussion of the individual enhanced standards that 
follows, a reference to application of the enhanced standards to 
covered entities is intended to include application of the enhanced 
standards to services provided to the covered entities, unless 
otherwise specified. The proposed standards for covered entities are 
described first; additional proposed standards for sector-critical 
systems then are listed separately.
Category 1--Cyber Risk Governance
    A key aspect of cyber risk governance is developing and maintaining 
a formal cyber risk management strategy, as well as a supporting 
framework of policies and procedures to implement the strategy, that is 
integrated into the overall strategic plans and risk governance 
structures of covered entities. Therefore, the agencies are considering 
standards under the cyber risk governance category that would be 
similar to the governance standards generally expected for large, 
complex financial organizations.\15\ For example, the standards would 
provide that the board of directors, or an appropriate board 
committee,\16\ of a covered entity must be responsible for approving 
the

[[Page 74321]]

entity's cyber risk management strategy and holding senior management 
accountable for establishing and implementing appropriate policies 
consistent with the strategy.
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    \15\ For OCC-regulated covered entities, see 12 CFR part 30 
Appendix D. An OCC-regulated covered entity would be expected to 
incorporate its cyber risk management strategy and framework into 
its overall risk management framework required pursuant to the ``OCC 
Guidelines Establishing Heightened Standards for Certain Large 
Insured National Banks, Insured Federal Savings Associations, and 
Insured Federal Branches'' set forth at 12 CFR part 30 Appendix D. 
These OCC guidelines establish minimum standards for the design and 
implementation of a risk governance framework for large insured 
national banks, insured federal savings associations, and insured 
federal branches of foreign banks. Among other items, the OCC 
guidelines state that the board of directors of a covered bank 
should require management to establish and implement an effective 
framework that complies with the guidelines and approve any 
significant changes to the framework; the board should actively 
oversee a covered bank's risk-taking activities and hold management 
accountable for adhering to the framework; and each covered bank 
should have a comprehensive written statement that articulates the 
bank's risk appetite and serves as a basis for the framework (i.e., 
a risk appetite statement). The OCC guidelines set forth roles and 
responsibilities for front line units, independent risk management, 
and internal audit. A Board-regulated covered entity would be 
expected to incorporate its cyber risk management strategy and 
framework into its overall corporate strategy and the institutional 
risk appetite maintained by the entity's board of directors. See SR 
letter 12-17, ``Consolidated Supervision Framework for Large 
Financial Institutions,'' which outlines the general supervisory 
expectation that large bank holding companies and nonbank financial 
companies maintain a clearly articulated corporate strategy and 
institutional risk appetite; see also 12 CFR part 252, subparts D 
and O, which establishes risk management requirements for certain 
large bank holding companies and nonbank financial companies.
    \16\ In the discussion of the enhanced standards that follows, a 
reference to the board of directors is intended to include the board 
of directors or an appropriate board committee.
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    Specifically, the agencies are considering, as an enhanced standard 
in this category, a requirement that covered entities develop a 
written, board-approved, enterprise-wide cyber risk management strategy 
that is incorporated into the overall business strategy and risk 
management of the firm.\17\ The strategy would articulate how the 
entity intends to address its inherent cyber risk (that is, its cyber 
risk before mitigating controls or other factors are taken into 
consideration) and how the entity would maintain an acceptable level of 
residual cyber risk (that is, its remaining cyber risk after mitigating 
controls and other factors have been taken into consideration) and 
maintain resilience on an ongoing basis.
---------------------------------------------------------------------------

    \17\ For Board-regulated covered entities, this would be part of 
the larger global risk management framework that is required by 12 
CFR 252.33.
---------------------------------------------------------------------------

    A covered entity also would be required to establish cyber risk 
tolerances consistent with the firm's risk appetite and strategy, and 
manage cyber risk appropriate to the nature of the operations of the 
firm. Thus, as part of the enhanced standard in this category, the 
agencies are considering requiring the entity's board of directors to 
review and approve the enterprise-wide cyber risk appetite and 
tolerances of the covered entity. The enhanced standard also would 
provide that a covered entity must reduce its residual cyber risk to 
the appropriate level approved by the board of directors.
    Covered entities would need to be able to identify and assess those 
activities and exposures that present cyber risk, then determine ways 
to aggregate them to assess the entity's residual cyber risk. This is 
important because cyber risk has the potential to produce losses large 
enough to threaten an entity's financial health, its reputation, or its 
ability to maintain core operations if faced with a material cyber 
event.
    The board of directors of a covered entity would oversee and hold 
senior management accountable for implementing the entity's cyber risk 
management framework. In this regard, the agencies are considering 
requiring the board of directors to have adequate expertise in 
cybersecurity or to maintain access to resources or staff with such 
expertise. Consistent with existing agency expectations, the enhanced 
standards would require the board of directors to have and maintain the 
ability to provide credible challenge to management in matters related 
to cybersecurity and the evaluation of cyber risks and resilience.
    The agencies also are considering requiring senior leaders with 
responsibility for cyber risk oversight to be independent of business 
line management. In this regard, these senior leaders would need to 
have direct, independent access to the board of directors and would 
independently inform the board of directors on an ongoing basis of the 
firm's cyber risk exposure and risk management practices, including 
known and emerging issues and trends.
    A covered entity would be required to establish an enterprise-wide 
cyber risk management framework that would include policies and 
reporting structures to support and implement the entity's cyber risk 
management strategy. The entity would be required to include in its 
framework delineated cyber risk management and oversight 
responsibilities for the organization, including reporting structures 
and expectations for independent risk management, internal control, and 
internal audit personnel; established mechanisms for evaluating whether 
the organization has sufficient resources to address the cyber risks 
facing the organization; and established policies for addressing any 
resource shortfalls or knowledge gaps. The entity also would be 
required to include in its cyber risk management framework mechanisms 
for identifying and responding to cyber incidents and threats, as well 
as procedures for testing the effectiveness of the entity's 
cybersecurity protocols and updating them as the threat landscape 
evolves.
Questions on Cyber Risk Governance
    13. How would a covered entity determine that it is managing cyber 
risk consistent with its stated risk appetite and tolerances? What 
other implementation challenges does managing cyber risk consistent 
with a covered entity's risk appetite and tolerances present?
    14. What are the incremental costs and benefits of establishing the 
contemplated standards for the roles, responsibilities, and adequate 
cybersecurity expertise (or access to adequate cybersecurity expertise) 
of the board of directors? To what extent do covered entities already 
have governance structures in place that are broadly consistent with 
the proposed cyber risk governance standards?
Category 2--Cyber Risk Management
    In general, the enhanced standards would require covered entities, 
to the greatest extent possible and consistent with their 
organizational structure, to integrate cyber risk management into the 
responsibilities of at least three independent functions (such as the 
three lines of defense risk-management model) with appropriate checks 
and balances. This would allow covered entities to more accurately and 
effectively identify, monitor, measure, manage, and report on cyber 
risk.
Business Units
    The agencies are considering requiring units responsible for the 
day-to-day business functions of a covered entity to assess, on an 
ongoing basis, the cyber risks associated with the activities of the 
business unit. Business units also would need to ensure that 
information regarding those risks is shared with senior management, 
including the chief executive officer (CEO), as appropriate, in a 
timely manner so that senior management can address and respond to 
emerging cyber risks and cyber incidents as they develop.
    As part of this proposed enhanced standard, business units would be 
required to adhere to procedures and processes necessary to comply with 
the covered entity's cyber risk management framework. Such procedures 
and processes would be designed to ensure that the applicable business 
unit's cyber risk is effectively identified, measured, monitored, and 
controlled, consistent with the covered entity's risk appetite and 
tolerances. Business units would assess the cyber risks and potential 
vulnerabilities associated with every business asset (that is, their 
workforce, data, technology, and facilities), service, and IT 
connection point for the respective unit, and update these assessments 
as threats, technology, and processes evolve. To this end, the covered 
entity would be expected to ensure that business units maintain, or 
have access to, resources and staff with the skill sets needed to 
comply with the unit's cybersecurity responsibilities.
Independent Risk Management
    The agencies are considering a requirement that covered entities 
incorporate enterprise-wide cyber risk management into the 
responsibilities of an independent risk management function. This 
function would report to the covered entity's chief risk officer and 
board of directors, as appropriate, regarding implementation of the 
firm's cyber risk management framework throughout the organization.

[[Page 74322]]

Independent risk management would be required to analyze cyber risk at 
the enterprise level to identify and ensure effective response to 
events with the potential to impact one or multiple operating units. 
Additionally, independent risk management would be continually required 
to assess the firm's overall exposure to cyber risk and promptly notify 
the CEO and board of directors, as appropriate, when its assessment of 
a particular cyber risk differs from that of a business unit, as well 
as of any instances when a unit of the covered entity has exceeded the 
entity's established cyber risk tolerances.
    On a continuous basis, independent risk management would be 
required to identify, measure, and monitor cyber risk across the 
enterprise, and to determine whether cyber risk controls are 
appropriately in place across the enterprise consistent with the 
entity's established risk appetite and tolerances. On an ongoing basis, 
the independent risk management function would be required to identify 
and assess the covered entity's material aggregate risks and determine 
whether actions need to be taken to strengthen risk management or 
reduce risk given changes in the covered entity's risk profile or other 
conditions, placing particular emphasis on sector-critical systems.
    Additionally, the agencies are considering requiring covered 
entities to assess the completeness, effectiveness, and timeliness with 
which they reduce the aggregate residual cyber risk of their systems to 
the appropriate, board-of-directors approved level. The Board is 
considering requiring covered entities, at the holding company level, 
to measure (quantitatively) the completeness, effectiveness, and 
timeliness with which they reduce the aggregate residual cyber risk of 
their systems to the appropriate, board-of-directors approved level. As 
noted, this is important because cyber risk has the potential to 
produce losses large enough to threaten an entity's financial health, 
its reputation, or its ability to maintain core operations if faced 
with a material cyber event.
    Therefore, the independent risk management function would be 
required to establish and maintain an up-to-date understanding of the 
structure of a covered entity's cybersecurity programs and supporting 
processes and systems, as well as their relationships to the evolving 
cyber threat landscape.
    To satisfy these requirements, it is essential that a covered 
entity's independent risk management function have and maintain 
sufficient independence, stature, authority, resources, and access to 
the board of directors to ensure that the operations of the entity are 
consistent with the cyber risk management framework. The reporting 
lines must be clear and separate from those for other operations and 
business units.
Audit Function
    Audit evaluates the effectiveness of risk management, internal 
controls, and governance processes, among other things, and advises 
management and the board of directors on whether a covered entity's 
policies and procedures are adequate to keep up with emerging risks and 
industry regulations. As such, audit plays an important role in risk 
management, internal control, and corporate governance.
    Consistent with a strong overall governance process, the agencies 
consider cyber risk and cyber risk management as important to the 
internal audit function at covered entities. Therefore, the agencies 
are considering explicitly requiring the audit function to assess 
whether the cyber risk management framework of a covered entity 
complies with applicable laws and regulations and is appropriate for 
its size, complexity, interconnectedness, and risk profile.
    Further, as part of this enhanced standard, audit would be required 
to incorporate an assessment of cyber risk management into the overall 
audit plan of the covered entity. The plan would be required to provide 
for an evaluation of the adequacy of compliance with the board-approved 
cyber risk management framework and cyber risk policies, procedures, 
and processes established by the firm's business units or independent 
risk management. Such an evaluation would be required to include the 
entire security lifecycle, including penetration testing and other 
vulnerability assessment activities as appropriate based on the size, 
complexity, scope of operations, and interconnectedness of the covered 
entity. The audit plan would be required to provide for an assessment 
of the business unit and independent risk management functions' 
capabilities to adapt as appropriate and remain in compliance with the 
covered entity's cyber risk management framework and within its stated 
risk appetite and tolerances.
Questions on Cyber Risk Management
    15. The agencies seek comment on the appropriateness of requiring 
covered entities to regularly report data on identified cyber risks and 
vulnerabilities directly to the CEO and board of directors and, if 
warranted, the frequency with which such reports should be made to 
various levels of management. What policies do covered entities 
currently follow in reporting material cyber risks and vulnerabilities 
to the CEO and board of directors?
    16. The agencies seek comment on requiring covered entities to 
organize themselves in a manner that is consistent with the 
contemplated enhanced standards for cyber risk management. Besides the 
approach outlined in the ANPR, what other approaches could ensure that 
entities are effectively identifying, monitoring, measuring, managing, 
and reporting on cyber risk?
Category 3--Internal Dependency Management
    Standards within the internal dependency management category are 
intended to ensure that covered entities have effective capabilities in 
place to identify and manage cyber risks associated with their business 
assets (that is, their workforce, data, technology, and facilities) 
throughout their lifespans. These risks may arise from a wide range of 
sources, including insider threats, data transmission errors, or the 
use of legacy systems acquired through a merger.
    A key aspect of the internal dependency management category is 
ensuring that covered entities continually assess and improve, as 
necessary, their effectiveness in reducing the cyber risks associated 
with internal dependencies on an enterprise-wide basis. As part of the 
overall cyber risk management strategy, as discussed in the cyber risk 
governance section of this ANPR, the agencies are considering a 
requirement that a covered entity integrate an internal dependency 
management strategy into the entity's overall strategic risk management 
plan. The strategy would guide and inform measures taken to reduce 
cyber risks associated with a covered entity's internal dependencies. 
The internal dependency management strategy would be designed to ensure 
that: Roles and responsibilities for internal dependency management are 
well defined; policies, standards, and procedures to identify and 
manage cyber risks associated with internal assets, including those 
connected to or supporting sector-critical systems, are established and 
regularly updated throughout those assets' lifespans; appropriate 
oversight is in place to monitor effectiveness in reducing cyber risks 
associated with internal dependencies; and appropriate compliance 
mechanisms are in place.

[[Page 74323]]

    Another key aspect of the internal dependency management category 
is having current and complete awareness of all internal assets and 
business functions that support a firm's cyber risk management 
strategy. The agencies are considering a requirement that covered 
entities maintain an inventory of all business assets on an enterprise-
wide basis prioritized according to the assets' criticality to the 
business functions they support, the firm's mission and the financial 
sector. Thus, covered entities would be required to maintain a current 
and complete listing of all internal assets and business functions, 
including mappings to other assets and other business functions, 
information flows, and interconnections. Covered entities would track 
connections among assets and cyber risk levels throughout the life 
cycles of the assets and support relevant data collection and analysis 
across the organization. This would contribute to establishing and 
implementing mechanisms to prioritize monitoring, incident response, 
and recovery of systems critical to the entity and to the financial 
sector. A covered entity's tracking capability would need to enable 
timely notification of internal cyber risk management issues to 
designated internal stakeholders. In addition, covered entities would 
support the reduction of the cyber risk exposure of business assets to 
the enterprise and the sector until the board-approved risk appetite 
and tolerances are achieved; and support timely responses to cyber 
threats to, and vulnerabilities of, the enterprise and the financial 
sector.
    Another key aspect within the internal dependency management 
category is establishing and applying appropriate controls to address 
the inherent cyber risk of a covered entity's assets. The agencies are 
considering a requirement that covered entities establish and apply 
appropriate controls to address the inherent cyber risk of their assets 
(taking into account the prioritization of the entity's business assets 
and the cyber risks they pose to the entity) by:
     Assessing the cyber risk of assets and their operating 
environments prior to deployment;
     continually applying controls and monitoring assets and 
their operating environments (including deviations from baseline 
cybersecurity configurations) over the lifecycle of the assets; and
     assessing relevant cyber risks to the assets (including 
insider threats to systems and data) and mitigating identified 
deviations, granted exceptions and known violations to internal 
dependency cyber risk management policies, standards, and procedures.
    As part of this enhanced standard, the agencies are considering 
requiring covered entities to continually apply appropriate controls to 
reduce the cyber risk of business assets to the enterprise and the 
financial sector to the board-approved level. The agencies are also 
considering a requirement that covered entities periodically conduct 
tests of back-ups to business assets to achieve resilience.
Category 4--External Dependency Management
    As noted, the term ``external dependencies'' refers to an entity's 
relationships with outside vendors, suppliers, customers, utilities, 
and other external organizations and service providers that the entity 
depends on to deliver services, as well as the information flows and 
interconnections between the entity and those external parties. In 
addition, the external dependency management category includes the 
management of interconnection risks associated with non-critical 
external parties that maintain trusted connections to important 
systems. Standards within the external dependency management category 
are intended to ensure that covered entities have effective 
capabilities in place to identify and manage cyber risks associated 
with their external dependencies and interconnection risks throughout 
these relationships.
    A key aspect of the external dependency management category is 
ensuring that covered entities continually assess and improve, as 
necessary, their effectiveness in reducing the cyber risks associated 
with external dependencies and interconnection risks enterprise-wide. 
As part of the overall cyber risk management strategy, as discussed in 
the cyber risk governance section of this ANPR, the agencies are 
considering a requirement that a covered entity integrate an external 
dependency management strategy into the entity's overall strategic risk 
management plan to address and reduce cyber risks associated with 
external dependencies and interconnection risks. This external 
dependency management strategy would ensure that roles and 
responsibilities for external dependency management are well defined; 
policies, standards, and procedures for external dependency management 
throughout the lifespan of the relationship (for example, due 
diligence, contracting and sub-contracting, onboarding, ongoing 
monitoring, change management, off boarding) are established and 
regularly updated; appropriate metrics are in place to measure 
effectiveness in reducing cyber risks associated with external 
dependencies; and appropriate compliance mechanisms are in place.
    As part of an external dependency management strategy, the agencies 
are considering a requirement that covered entities establish effective 
policies, plans, and procedures to identify and manage real-time cyber 
risks associated with external dependencies, particularly those 
connected to or supporting sector-critical systems and operations, 
throughout their lifespans.
    Another key aspect of the external dependency management category 
is having the ability to monitor in real time all external dependencies 
and trusted connections that support a covered entity's cyber risk 
management strategy. The agencies are considering a requirement that 
covered entities have a current, accurate, and complete awareness of, 
and prioritize, all external dependencies and trusted connections 
enterprise-wide based on their criticality to the business functions 
they support, the firm's mission, and the financial sector. Thus, 
covered entities would be able to generate and maintain a current, 
accurate, and complete listing of all external dependencies and 
business functions, including mappings to supported assets and business 
functions. Covered entities would be required to prioritize monitoring, 
incident response, and recovery of systems critical to the enterprise 
and the financial sector; support the continued reduction of the cyber 
risk exposure of external dependencies to the enterprise and the sector 
until the board-approved cyber risk appetite and tolerances are 
achieved; support timely responses to cyber risks to the enterprise and 
the sector; monitor the universe of external dependencies that connect 
to assets supporting systems critical to the enterprise and the sector; 
support relevant data collection and analysis across the organization; 
and track connections among external dependencies, organizational 
assets, and cyber risk levels throughout their lifespans. A covered 
entity's tracking capability would enable timely notification of cyber 
risk management issues to designated stakeholders.
    Another key aspect within the external dependency management 
category is establishing and applying appropriate controls to address 
the cyber risk presented by each external partner throughout the 
lifespan of the relationship. The agencies are

[[Page 74324]]

considering a requirement that covered entities analyze and address the 
cyber risks that emerge from reviews of their external relationships, 
and identify and periodically test alternative solutions in case an 
external partner fails to perform as expected. As part of this 
requirement and in order to address the rapidly changing and complex 
threat landscape, the agencies are considering a requirement that 
covered entities continually apply and evaluate appropriate controls to 
reduce the cyber risk of external dependencies to the enterprise and 
the sector.
Questions on Internal and External Dependency Management
    17. The agencies request comment on the comprehensiveness and 
effectiveness of the proposed standards for internal and external 
dependency management in achieving the agencies' objective of 
increasing the resilience of covered entities, third-party service 
providers to covered entities, and the financial sector.
    18. What challenges and burdens would covered entities encounter in 
maintaining an internal and external dependency management strategy 
consistent with that described by the agencies?
    19. How do the proposed internal and external dependency management 
standards compare with processes already in place at banking 
organizations?
    20. What other approaches could the agencies use to evaluate a 
covered entity's internal and external dependency management 
strategies? Please be specific as to each approach.
    21. How would the proposed standards for internal and external 
dependency management impact a covered entity's use of a third-party 
service provider?
    22. What additional issues should the agencies consider related to 
internal and external dependency management and the covered entities' 
use of third-party service providers? How should those issues be 
evaluated by the agencies? Please be specific.
Category 5--Incident Response, Cyber Resilience, and Situational 
Awareness
    Standards within the incident response, cyber resilience, and 
situational awareness category would be designed to ensure that covered 
entities plan for, respond to, contain, and rapidly recover from 
disruptions caused by cyber incidents, thereby strengthening their 
cyber resilience as well as that of the financial sector. Covered 
entities would be required to be capable of operating critical business 
functions in the face of cyber-attacks and continuously enhance their 
cyber resilience. In addition, covered entities would be required to 
establish processes designed to maintain effective situational 
awareness capabilities to reliably predict, analyze, and respond to 
changes in the operating environment.
    The agencies are considering a requirement that covered entities 
establish and maintain effective incident response and cyber resilience 
governance, strategies, and capacities that enable the organizations to 
anticipate, withstand, contain, and rapidly recover from a disruption 
caused by a significant cyber event. The agencies are considering a 
requirement that covered entities establish and implement plans to 
identify and mitigate the cyber risks they pose through 
interconnectedness to sector partners and external stakeholders to 
prevent cyber contagion. In addition, the agencies are considering a 
requirement that covered entities establish and maintain enterprise-
wide cyber resilience and incident response programs, based on their 
enterprise-wide cyber risk management strategies and supported by 
appropriate policies, procedures, governance, staffing, and independent 
review. These cyber resilience and incident response programs would be 
required to include effective escalation protocols linked to 
organizational decision levels, cyber contagion containment procedures, 
communication strategies, and processes to incorporate lessons learned 
back into the program. Cyber resilience strategies and exercises would 
be required to consider wide-scale recovery scenarios and be designed 
to achieve institutional resilience, support the achievement of 
financial sector-wide resilience, and minimize risks to or from 
interconnected parties.
    The IT Handbook calls for examiners to determine whether covered 
entities have established plans to address recovery and resilience 
strategies for cyber-attacks that may disrupt access, corrupt data, or 
destroy data or systems.\18\ In addition to establishing recovery time 
objectives (RTOs), recovery and resilience strategies should address 
the potential for malware or corrupted data to replicate or propagate 
through connected systems or high availability solutions. For cyber-
attacks that may potentially corrupt or destroy critical data, recovery 
strategies should be designed to achieve recovery point objectives 
based on the criticality of the data necessary to keep the institution 
operational.
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    \18\ FFIEC IT Examination Handbook, Business Continuity 
Planning, Appendix J.
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    In this category, the agencies also are considering a requirement 
that covered entities establish and implement strategies to meet the 
entity's obligations for performing core business functions in the 
event of a disruption, including the potential for multiple concurrent 
or widespread interruptions and cyber-attacks on multiple elements of 
interconnected critical infrastructure, such as energy and 
telecommunications.
    The preservation of critical records in the event of a large-scale 
or significant cyber event is essential to maintaining confidence in 
the banking system and to facilitating resolution or recovery processes 
after a catastrophic event. The agencies are therefore considering 
requiring covered entities to establish protocols for secure, 
immutable, off-line storage of critical records, including financial 
records of the institution, loan data, asset management account 
information, and daily deposit account records, including balances and 
ownership details, formatted using certain defined data standards to 
allow for restoration of these records by another financial 
institution, service provider, or the FDIC in the event of resolution.
    Transition plans are essential in the event a service is terminated 
or an entity cannot meet its obligations. Thus, the agencies are 
considering a requirement that covered entities establish plans and 
mechanisms to transfer business, where feasible, to another entity or 
service provider with minimal disruption and within prescribed time 
frames if the original covered entity or service provider is unable to 
perform. As a result, if performance is not feasible and contractual 
termination/remediation provisions have been exercised, client data 
would be returned to the original covered entity or service provider in 
a method that is transferable to an alternate entity or service 
provider with minimal disruption to the operations of the covered 
entity.
    Testing the cyber resilience of operations and services helps to 
identify potential threats to the ongoing performance of the operation 
or service. A prolonged disruption of a significant operation could 
generate systemic risk. The agencies are considering a requirement that 
covered entities conduct specific testing that addresses disruptive, 
destructive, corruptive, or any other cyber event that could affect 
their ability to service clients; and significant downtime that would 
threaten the business resilience of clients. In addition, the agencies 
are considering a requirement that the

[[Page 74325]]

testing address external interdependencies, such as connectivity to 
markets, payment systems, clearing entities, messaging services, and 
other critical service providers or partners; that the testing of cyber 
resilience be undertaken jointly where critical dependencies exist; and 
that the testing validate the effectiveness of internal and external 
communication protocols with stakeholders.
    A key element of situational awareness is the timely 
identification, analysis, and tracking of data about the state of, and 
potential cyber risks to, the organization. The agencies are 
considering a requirement that covered entities maintain an ongoing 
situational awareness of their operational status and cybersecurity 
posture to pre-empt cyber events and respond rapidly to them. Covered 
entities also would be required to establish and maintain threat 
profiles \19\ for identified threats to the firm; establish and 
maintain threat modeling \20\ capabilities; gather actionable cyber 
threat intelligence and perform security analytics on an ongoing basis; 
and establish and maintain capabilities for ongoing vulnerability 
management.
---------------------------------------------------------------------------

    \19\ Threat profiles include information about critical assets, 
threat actors, and details about how threat actors might attempt to 
compromise those critical assets.
    \20\ Threat modeling refers to using a structured process to 
identify how critical assets might be compromised by a threat actor 
and why, what level of protection is needed for those critical 
assets, and what the impact would be if that protection failed.
---------------------------------------------------------------------------

Questions on Incident Response, Cyber Resilience, and Situational 
Awareness
    23. How well do the proposed standards for incident response, cyber 
resilience, and situational awareness address the safety and soundness 
of individual financial institutions and potential systemic cyber risk 
to the financial sector, including with respect to the testing 
strategies and approaches? How could they be improved?
    24. What is the extent to which it would be operationally and/or 
commercially feasible to comply with requirements to use certain 
defined data standards in order to increase the substitutability of 
third-party relationships to reduce recovery times for systems impacted 
by a significant cyber event?
    25. How do covered entities currently evaluate their incident 
response and cyber resilience capabilities? What factors should the 
agencies consider essential in considering a covered entity's incident 
response and cyber response capabilities?
    26. How do covered entities currently evaluate their situational 
awareness capabilities? What factors should the agencies consider 
essential in considering a covered entity's situational awareness 
capabilities?
    27. What other factors should be included within the incident 
response, cyber resilience, and situational awareness category?
    28. What additional requirements should the agencies consider to 
improve the resilience or situational awareness of a covered entity or 
the ability of a covered entity to respond to a cyber-attack?

VI. Standards for Sector-Critical Systems of Covered Entities

    As noted, the agencies are considering two tiers of standards, with 
more stringent standards to apply to systems of covered entities that 
are critical to the functioning of the financial sector.
    In particular, the agencies are considering a requirement that 
covered entities minimize the residual cyber risk of sector-critical 
systems by implementing the most effective, commercially available 
controls. Minimizing residual cyber risk means substantially mitigating 
the risk of a disruption or failure due to a cyber event.
    As a second sector-critical standard, the agencies are considering 
requiring covered entities to establish an RTO of two hours for their 
sector-critical systems, validated by testing, to recover from a 
disruptive, corruptive, or destructive cyber event. Testing programs 
would include a range of scenarios, including severe but plausible 
scenarios, and would challenge matters such as communications 
protocols, governance arrangements, and resumption and recovery 
practices. As stated in the Sound Practices Paper, an RTO is the 
``amount of time in which a firm aims to recover clearing and 
settlement activities after a wide-scale disruption with the overall 
goal of completing material pending transactions on the scheduled 
settlement date.'' The scope of application of this proposed sector-
critical standard could go beyond the core clearing and settlement 
organizations discussed in the Sound Practices Paper to include other 
large, interconnected financial systems where a cyber-attack or 
disruption also could have a significant impact on the U.S. financial 
sector. With advances in technology and consistent with the two-hour 
RTO for core clearing and settlement activities in the Sound Practices 
Paper, the agencies are considering establishing a two-hour RTO for the 
sector-critical systems of covered entities.
    Additionally, the Board is considering requiring Board-supervised 
covered entities, at the holding company level, to measure 
(quantitatively) their ability to reduce the aggregate residual cyber 
risk of their sector-critical systems and their ability to reduce such 
risk to a minimal level. Such measurement would take into account the 
risks associated with internal dependencies, external dependencies, and 
trusted connections with access to sector-critical systems.
Questions on Standards for Sector-Critical Systems of Covered Entities
    29. The agencies request comment on the appropriateness and 
feasibility of establishing a two-hour RTO for all sector-critical 
systems. What would be the incremental costs to covered entities of 
moving toward a two-hour RTO objective for these systems?
    30. What impact would a two-hour RTO have on covered entities' use 
of third-party service providers? What challenges or burdens would be 
presented by the requirement of a two-hour RTO for covered entities who 
rely on third-party service providers for their critical systems? How 
should the agencies weigh such costs against other costs associated 
with implementing the enhanced standards outlined in this ANPR?
    31. How should the agencies implement the two-hour RTO objective? 
For example, would an extended implementation timeline help to mitigate 
costs, and if so, what timeline would be reasonable?
    32. Should different RTOs be set for different types of operations 
and, if so, how? Should RTOs be expected to become more stringent over 
time as technology advances?
    33. The Board requests comment on the benefits of requiring Board-
supervised covered entities, at the holding company level, to measure 
the residual cyber risk of their sector-critical systems on a 
quantitative basis. How would this approach to measuring cyber risk 
compare with efforts already underway at holding companies to manage 
and measure their cyber risk? For example, what processes do holding 
companies already have in place to measure their residual cyber risk? 
What challenges and costs would holding companies face in measuring 
their residual cyber risk quantitatively? What are the benefits of 
requiring holding companies to reduce the residual risk of their 
sector-critical systems to a minimal level, taking into account the 
risks associated with internal and external dependencies connected to 
or supporting their sector-critical systems?

[[Page 74326]]

VII. Approach to Quantifying Cyber Risk

    The agencies are seeking to develop a consistent, repeatable 
methodology to support the ongoing measurement of cyber risk within 
covered entities. Such a methodology could be a valuable tool for 
covered entities and their regulators to assess how well an entity is 
managing its aggregate cyber risk and mitigating the residual cyber 
risk of its sector-critical systems. At this time the agencies are not 
aware of any consistent methodologies to measure cyber risk across the 
financial sector using specific cyber risk management objectives. The 
agencies are interested in receiving comments on potential 
methodologies to quantify inherent and residual cyber risk and compare 
entities across the financial sector.
    The agencies are familiar with different methodologies to measure 
cyber risk for the financial sector. Among others, these include 
existing methodologies like the FAIR Institute's Factor Analysis of 
Information Risk standard and Carnegie Mellon's Goal-Question-
Indicator-Metric process. Building upon these and other methodologies, 
the agencies are considering how best to measure cyber risk in a 
consistent, repeatable manner.
Questions on Approach to Quantifying Cyber Risk Section
    34. What current tools and practices, if any, do covered entities 
use to assess the cyber risks that their activities, systems and 
operations pose to other entities within the financial sector, and to 
assess the cyber risks that other entities' activities, systems and 
operations pose to them? How is such risk currently identified, 
measured, and monitored?
    35. What other models, frameworks, or reference materials should 
the agencies review in considering how best to measure and monitor 
cyber risk?
    36. What methodologies should the agencies consider for the purpose 
of measuring inherent and residual cyber risk quantitatively and 
qualitatively? What risk factors should agencies consider incorporating 
into the measurement of inherent risk? How should the risk factors be 
consistently measured and weighted?

VIII. Considerations for Implementation of the Enhanced Standards

    The agencies are considering various regulatory approaches to 
establishing enhanced standards for covered entities. The approaches 
range from establishing the standards through a policy statement or 
guidance to imposing the standards through a detailed regulation. Under 
one approach, the agencies could propose the standards as a combination 
of a regulatory requirement to maintain a risk management framework for 
cyber risks along with a policy statement or guidance that describes 
minimum expectations for the framework, such as policies, procedures, 
and practices commensurate with the inherent cyber risk level of the 
covered entity. This approach would be similar to the approach that the 
agencies have taken in other areas of prudential supervision, such as 
the Interagency Guidelines Establishing Standards for Safety and 
Soundness and the Interagency Guidelines Establishing Information 
Security Standards.\21\
---------------------------------------------------------------------------

    \21\ See 12 CFR part 208, App. D-1, D-2; 12 CFR part 225, App. F 
(Board); 12 CFR part 364, App. A, B (FDIC); 12 CFR part 30, App. A, 
B, and D (OCC).
---------------------------------------------------------------------------

    Under a second approach, the agencies could propose regulations 
that impose specific cyber risk management standards. For example, the 
standards could require covered entities to establish a cybersecurity 
framework commensurate with the covered entity's structure, risk 
profile, complexity, activities, and size. Such standards would address 
the five categories of cyber risk management, discussed above, that the 
agencies consider key to a comprehensive cyber risk management program: 
(1) Cyber risk governance; (2) cyber risk management; (3) internal 
dependency management; (4) external dependency management; and (5) 
incident response, cyber resilience, and situational awareness. Within 
each category, a covered entity would be expected to establish and 
maintain policies, procedures, practices, controls, personnel and 
systems that address the applicable category, and to establish and 
maintain a corporate governance structure that implements the cyber 
risk management program on an enterprise-wide basis and along business 
line levels, monitors compliance with the program, and adjusts 
corporate practices to address the changes in risk presented by the 
firm's operations.
    Under a third approach, the agencies could propose a regulatory 
framework that is more detailed than the second approach. As with the 
second approach, the regulation could contain standards for the five 
categories of cyber risk management. However, in contrast to the second 
approach, the regulation would include details on the specific 
objectives and practices a firm would be required to achieve in each 
area of concern in order to demonstrate that its cyber risk management 
program can adapt to changes in a firm's operations and to the evolving 
cyber environment.
    In considering which option, or combination of options, to pursue 
to implement the standards, the agencies will consider whether the 
approach adopted ensures that the enhanced standards are clear, the 
additional effort required to implement the standards, whether the 
standards are sufficiently adaptable to address the changing cyber 
environment, and the potential costs and other burdens associated with 
implementing the standards.
Questions on Considerations for Implementation of the Enhanced 
Standards
    37. What are the potential benefits or drawbacks associated with 
each of the options for implementing the standards discussed above?
    38. What are the trade-offs, in terms of the potential costs and 
other burdens, among the three options discussed above? The agencies 
invite commenters to submit data about the trade-offs among the three 
options discussed above.
    39. Which approach has the potential to most effectively implement 
the agencies' expectations for enhanced cyber risk management?

    Dated: October 19, 2016.
Thomas J. Curry,
Comptroller of the Currency.
    By order of the Board of Governors of the Federal Reserve 
System, October 19, 2016.
Robert deV. Frierson,
Secretary of the Board.
    Dated at Washington, DC, this 19th day of October, 2016.

    By order of the Board of Directors.

Federal Deposit Insurance Corporation.

Federal Deposit Insurance Corporation by
Robert E. Feldman,
Executive Secretary.
[FR Doc. 2016-25871 Filed 10-25-16; 8:45 am]
 BILLING CODE 4810-33-P; 6210-01-P; 6714-01-P



                                                                                                                                                                                                74315

                                               Proposed Rules                                                                                                Federal Register
                                                                                                                                                             Vol. 81, No. 207

                                                                                                                                                             Wednesday, October 26, 2016



                                               This section of the FEDERAL REGISTER                    external dependency management; and                      OCC: Because paper mail in the
                                               contains notices to the public of the proposed          incident response, cyber resilience, and              Washington, DC area and at the OCC is
                                               issuance of rules and regulations. The                  situational awareness. The agencies are               subject to delay, commenters are
                                               purpose of these notices is to give interested          considering implementing the enhanced                 encouraged to submit comments
                                               persons an opportunity to participate in the            standards in a tiered manner, imposing                through the Federal eRulemaking Portal
                                               rule making prior to the adoption of the final
                                               rules.
                                                                                                       more stringent standards on the systems               or email, if possible. Please use the title
                                                                                                       of those entities that are critical to the            ‘‘Enhanced Cyber Risk Management
                                                                                                       functioning of the financial sector.                  Standards’’ to facilitate the organization
                                               DEPARTMENT OF THE TREASURY                              DATES: Comments must be received by                   and distribution of the comments. You
                                                                                                       January 17, 2017.                                     may submit comments by any of the
                                               Office of the Comptroller of the                                                                              following methods:
                                                                                                       ADDRESSES: Comments should be
                                               Currency                                                                                                         • Federal eRulemaking Portal—
                                                                                                       directed to:
                                                                                                                                                             ‘‘Regulations.gov’’: Go to
                                               12 CFR Part 30                                             Board: When submitting comments,                   www.regulations.gov. Enter ‘‘Docket ID
                                                                                                       please consider submitting your                       OCC–2016–0016’’ in the Search Box and
                                               [Docket ID OCC–2016–0016]                               comments by email or fax because paper                click ‘‘Search.’’ Click on ‘‘Comment
                                               RIN 1557–AE06                                           mail in the Washington, DC area and at                Now’’ to submit public comments.
                                                                                                       the Board may be subject to delay. You                   • Click on the ‘‘Help’’ tab on the
                                               FEDERAL RESERVE SYSTEM                                  may submit comments, identified by                    Regulations.gov home page to get
                                                                                                       Docket No. R–1550 and RIN 7100–AE–                    information on using Regulations.gov,
                                               12 CFR Chapter II                                       61 by any of the following methods:                   including instructions for submitting
                                               [Docket No. R–1550]
                                                                                                          • Agency Web site: http://                         public comments.
                                                                                                       www.federalreserve.gov. Follow the                       • Email: regs.comments@
                                               RIN 7100–AE 61                                          instructions for submitting comments at               occ.treas.gov.
                                                                                                       http://www.federalreserve.gov/                           • Mail: Legislative and Regulatory
                                               FEDERAL DEPOSIT INSURANCE                               generalinfo/foia/ProposedRegs.cfm.
                                               CORPORATION                                                                                                   Activities Division, Office of the
                                                                                                          • Federal eRulemaking Portal: http://              Comptroller of the Currency, 400 7th
                                                                                                       www.regulations.gov. Follow the                       Street SW., Suite 3E–218, mail stop 9W–
                                               12 CFR Part 364                                         instructions for submitting comments.                 11, Washington, DC 20219.
                                               RIN 3064–AE45                                              • Email: regs.comments@                               • Hand Delivery/Courier: 400 7th
                                                                                                       federalreserve.gov. Include docket and                Street SW., Suite 3E–218, mail stop 9W–
                                               Enhanced Cyber Risk Management                          RIN numbers in the subject line of the                11, Washington, DC 20219.
                                               Standards                                               message.                                                 • Fax: (571) 465–4326.
                                               AGENCY:  The Board of Governors of the                     • FAX: (202) 452–3819 or (202) 452–                   Instructions: You must include
                                               Federal Reserve System; the Office of                   3102.                                                 ‘‘OCC’’ as the agency name and ‘‘Docket
                                               the Comptroller of the Currency; and the                   Mail: Robert deV. Frierson, Secretary,             ID OCC–2016–0016’’ in your comment.
                                               Federal Deposit Insurance Corporation.                  Board of Governors of the Federal                     In general, OCC will enter all comments
                                               ACTION: Joint advance notice of                         Reserve System, 20th Street and                       received into the docket and publish
                                               proposed rulemaking.                                    Constitution Avenue NW., Washington,                  them on the Regulations.gov Web site
                                                                                                       DC 20551.                                             without change, including any business
                                               SUMMARY:   The Board of Governors of the                   All public comments will be made                   or personal information that you
                                               Federal Reserve System (Board), the                     available on the Board’s Web site at                  provide such as name and address
                                               Office of the Comptroller of the                        http://www.federalreserve.gov/                        information, email addresses, or phone
                                               Currency (OCC), and the Federal                         generalinfo/foia/ProposedRegs.cfm as                  numbers. Comments received, including
                                               Deposit Insurance Corporation (FDIC)                    submitted, unless modified for technical              attachments and other supporting
                                               (collectively, the agencies) are inviting               reasons. Accordingly, your comments                   materials, are part of the public record
                                               comment on an advance notice of                         will not be edited to remove any                      and subject to public disclosure. Do not
                                               proposed rulemaking (ANPR) regarding                    identifying or contact information.                   enclose any information in your
                                               enhanced cyber risk management                          Public comments may also be viewed                    comment or supporting materials that
                                               standards (enhanced standards) for large                electronically or in paper form in Room               you consider confidential or
                                               and interconnected entities under their                 3515, 1801 K Street NW. (between 18th                 inappropriate for public disclosure.
                                               supervision and those entities’ service                 and 19th Streets NW.), Washington, DC                    You may review comments and other
                                               providers. The agencies are considering                 20006 between 9:00 a.m. and 5:00 p.m.                 related materials that pertain to this
                                               establishing enhanced standards to                      on weekdays. For security reasons, the                rulemaking action by any of the
                                               increase the operational resilience of                  Board requires that visitors make an                  following methods:
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                                               these entities and reduce the impact on                 appointment to inspect comments. You                     • Viewing Comments Electronically:
                                               the financial system in case of a cyber                 may do so by calling (202) 452–3684.                  Go to www.regulations.gov. Enter
                                               event experienced by one of these                       Upon arrival, visitors will be required to            ‘‘Docket ID OCC–2016–0016’’ in the
                                               entities. The ANPR addresses five                       present valid government-issued photo                 Search box and click ‘‘Search.’’ Click on
                                               categories of cyber standards: Cyber risk               identification and to submit to security              ‘‘Open Docket Folder’’ on the right side
                                               governance; cyber risk management;                      screening in order to inspect and                     of the screen and then ‘‘Comments.’’
                                               internal dependency management;                         photocopy comments.                                   Comments can be filtered by clicking on


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                                               74316               Federal Register / Vol. 81, No. 207 / Wednesday, October 26, 2016 / Proposed Rules

                                               ‘‘View All’’ and then using the filtering               McDonough, Special Counsel, (202)                     transactions and services and play
                                               tools on the left side of the screen.                   452–2036; or Claudia Von Pervieux,                    critical roles in fostering financial
                                                  • Click on the ‘‘Help’’ tab on the                   Counsel, (202) 452–2552; or Michelle                  stability in the United States. Third
                                               Regulations.gov home page to get                        Kidd, Counsel, (202) 736–5554, Legal                  parties that provide payments
                                               information on using Regulations.gov.                   Division; for persons who are deaf or                 processing, core banking, and other
                                               Supporting materials may be viewed by                   hard of hearing, TTY (202) 263–4869.                  financial technology services to these
                                               clicking on ‘‘Open Docket Folder’’ and                    OCC: Bethany Dugan, Deputy                          participants in the financial sector also
                                               then clicking on ‘‘Supporting                           Comptroller for Operational Risk, (202)               provide services that are vital to the
                                               Documents.’’ The docket may be viewed                   649–6949; or Kevin Greenfield, Director,              financial sector.
                                               after the close of the comment period in                Bank Information Technology, (202)                       The Board, the OCC, and the FDIC
                                               the same manner as during the comment                   649–6954; or Eric Gott, Risk Team Lead                have incorporated information security
                                               period.                                                 for Governance and Operational Risk,                  into their supervisory review of
                                                  • Viewing Comments Personally: You                   Large Bank Supervision, (202) 649–                    information technology (IT) programs at
                                               may personally inspect and photocopy                    7181; or Patrick Kelly, Bank Examiner,                supervised banking organizations for
                                               comments at the OCC, 400 7th Street                     Critical Infrastructure Protection, (202)             many years. The agencies also review
                                               SW., Washington, DC 20219. For                          649–5519; or Carl Kaminski, Special                   the services of third-party service
                                               security reasons, the OCC requires that                 Counsel, Beth Knickerbocker, Counsel,                 providers that support those entities,
                                               visitors make an appointment to inspect                 or Rima Kundnani, Attorney, Legislative               and the Board includes information
                                               comments. You may do so by calling                      and Regulatory Activities Division,                   security as part of the supervisory
                                               (202) 649–6700 or, for persons who are                  (202) 649–5490, Office of the                         program for nonbank financial
                                               deaf or hard of hearing, TTY, (202) 649–                Comptroller of the Currency, 400 7th                  companies and FMIs.
                                               5597. Upon arrival, visitors will be                    Street SW., Washington, DC 20219.                        In response to expanding cyber risks,
                                               required to present valid government-                     FDIC: Donald Saxinger, Senior                       the agencies are considering
                                               issued photo identification and to                      Examination Specialist, IT Supervision                establishing enhanced standards for the
                                               submit to security screening in order to                Branch, Division of Risk Management                   largest and most interconnected entities
                                               inspect and photocopy comments.                         Supervision, (703) 254–0214; or John                  under their supervision, as well as for
                                                  FDIC: You may submit comments,                       Dorsey, Counsel, (202) 898–3807.                      services that these entities receive from
                                               identified by RIN 3064–AE45, by any of                  Supervision & Legislation Branch, Legal               third parties. The term ‘‘covered
                                               the following methods:                                  Division.                                             entities’’ is used throughout this
                                                  Agency Web site: http://www.fdic.gov/                I. Background                                         document to refer to entities potentially
                                               regulations/laws/federal/propose.html.                                                                        covered by the standards described in
                                                                                                          With advances in financial
                                               Follow instructions for submitting                                                                            this ANPR. The enhanced standards
                                                                                                       technology, financial institutions and
                                               comments on the Agency Web site.                        consumers alike have become                           would be designed to increase covered
                                                  • Email: Comments@fdic.gov. Include                  increasingly dependent on technology                  entities’ operational resilience and
                                               the RIN 3064–AE45 on the subject line                   to facilitate financial transactions. In              reduce the potential impact on the
                                               of the message.                                         addition, the largest, most complex                   financial system in the event of a
                                                  • Mail: Robert E. Feldman, Executive                 financial institutions rely heavily on                failure, cyber-attack, or the failure to
                                               Secretary, Attention: Comments, Federal                 technology to engage in national and                  implement appropriate cyber risk
                                               Deposit Insurance Corporation, 550 17th                 international banking activities and to               management.
                                               Street NW., Washington, DC 20429.                       provide critical services to the financial               The agencies are considering
                                                  • Hand Delivery: Comments may be                     sector and the U.S. economy.                          implementing the enhanced standards
                                               hand delivered to the guard station at                     As technology dependence in the                    in a tiered manner, imposing more
                                               the rear of the 550 17th Street Building                financial sector continues to grow, so do             stringent standards on the systems of
                                               (located on F Street) on business days                  opportunities for high-impact                         covered entities that are critical to the
                                               between 7:00 a.m. and 5:00 p.m.                         technology failures and cyber-attacks.                functioning of the financial sector,
                                                  Public Inspection: All comments                      Due to the interconnectedness of the                  referred to in this ANPR as ‘‘sector-
                                               received must include the agency name                   U.S. financial system, a cyber incident               critical systems.’’
                                               and RIN 3064–AE45 for this rulemaking.                  or failure at one interconnected entity                  The agencies are seeking comment on
                                               All comments received will be posted                    may not only impact the safety and                    all aspects of the enhanced standards
                                               without change to http://www.fdic.gov/                  soundness of the entity, but also other               described in this ANPR. The agencies
                                               regulations/laws/federal/propose.html,                  financial entities with potentially                   plan to use information collected in this
                                               including any personal information                      systemic consequences. For example,                   ANPR to develop a more detailed
                                               provided. Paper copies of public                        depository institutions and depository                proposal for consideration. The agencies
                                               comments may be ordered from the                        institution holding companies play an                 will again invite public comment on a
                                               FDIC Public Information Center, 3501                    important role in U.S. payment,                       detailed proposal before adopting any
                                               North Fairfax Drive, Room E–1002,                       clearing, and settlement arrangements                 final rule.
                                               Arlington, VA 22226 by telephone at                     and provide access to credit for                      II. Relationship to Existing
                                               (877) 275–3342 or (703) 562–2200.                       businesses and households. Nonbank                    Requirements and Guidance
                                               FOR FURTHER INFORMATION CONTACT:                        financial companies that the Financial
                                                  Board: Anna Lee Hewko, Associate                     Stability Oversight Council (FSOC) has                a. Existing Supervisory Programs
                                               Director, (202) 530–6260; or Matthew                    determined should be supervised by the                  As noted, the agencies have existing
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                                               Hayduk, Manager, (202) 973–6190; or                     Board (referred to in the ANPR as                     supervisory programs that contain
                                               Julia Philipp, Senior Supervisory                       nonbank financial companies) perform                  general expectations for cybersecurity
                                               Financial Analyst, (202) 452–3940; or                   critical functions for the U.S. financial             practices at financial institutions and
                                               Christopher Olson, Senior Supervisory                   system, and financial market                          third-party service providers. The
                                               Financial Analyst, (202) 912–4609,                      infrastructures (FMIs) facilitate the                 enhanced standards would be integrated
                                               Division of Banking Supervision and                     payment, clearing, and recording of                   into the existing supervisory framework
                                               Regulation; or Benjamin W.                              monetary and other financial                          by establishing enhanced supervisory


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                                                                   Federal Register / Vol. 81, No. 207 / Wednesday, October 26, 2016 / Proposed Rules                                                74317

                                               expectations for the entities and services              requirements.4 The Guidelines require                 c. NIST Cybersecurity Framework
                                               that potentially pose heightened cyber                  insured depository institutions to
                                               risk to the safety and soundness of the                 implement information security                           The NIST CSF is a voluntary
                                               financial sector.                                       programs to ensure the security and                   framework for organizations to better
                                                  Through the Federal Financial                        confidentiality of customer information;              understand, manage, and reduce their
                                               Institutions Examination Council                        protect against any anticipated threats               cybersecurity risk. The CSF is intended
                                               (FFIEC), the agencies issued the                        or hazards to the security or integrity of            to be customized by different business
                                               Uniform Rating System for Information                   such information; protect against                     sectors and individual organizations to
                                               Technology (URSIT) in 1978 (revised                     unauthorized access to or use of such                 best suit their risks, situation, and
                                               January 20, 1999).1 The URSIT rating is                 information that could result in                      needs. It was also designed to improve
                                               used by federal and state regulators to                 substantial harm or inconvenience to                  communications, awareness, and
                                               uniformly assess IT risks at financial                  any customer; and ensure the proper                   understanding among IT, planning and
                                               institutions, their affiliates, and service             disposal of customer and consumer                     operating units, and senior executives,
                                               providers 2 for the purpose of                          information.                                          to better address cyber risks. The NIST
                                               identifying those institutions that                       Additionally, the agencies have                     CSF Core consists of five concurrent and
                                               require special supervisory attention.                  interagency guidelines that establish                 continuous functions: Identify, Protect,
                                               The URSIT framework includes                            safety and soundness standards,                       Detect, Respond, and Recover. Taken
                                               elements to assess data security and                    including operational and managerial                  together, these functions provide a high-
                                               other risk management factors necessary                 standards, for depository institutions.5              level, strategic view of the lifecycle of
                                               to determine the quality, integrity, and                These guidelines require an insured                   an organization’s management of
                                               reliability of the financial institution’s              depository institution to have internal               cybersecurity risk.
                                               or third-party service provider’s IT. The               controls and information systems                         Similar to the NIST CSF, the
                                               proposed enhanced standards would                       appropriate to the size of the institution            enhanced standards would provide a
                                               not replace the URSIT ratings but could                 and to the nature, scope, and risk of its             clear set of objectives for sound cyber
                                               be used, in part, to inform the cyber-                  activities and that provide for, among                risk management. However, the binding
                                               related elements of the URSIT rating for                other requirements, effective risk                    requirements set forth in the enhanced
                                               covered entities. For example,                          assessment and adequate procedures to                 standards would be designed
                                               supervisory work related to the                         safeguard and manage assets. Insured                  specifically to address the cyber risks of
                                               proposed external dependency                            depository institutions are also required             the largest, most interconnected U.S.
                                               management standard discussed in this                   to have internal audit systems based on               financial entities.
                                               ANPR could be used, in part, to inform                  the same criteria that provide for
                                               the development and acquisition                         adequate testing and review of                        d. CPMI–IOSCO Guidance
                                               component of the URSIT rating.                          information systems. The Guidelines
                                                  In 2003, the FFIEC published the first               and safety and soundness standards                       In June 2016, the Committee on
                                               in a series of booklets on IT that make                 would continue to apply to covered                    Payments and Market Infrastructures
                                               up the IT Handbook. The IT Handbook                     entities that are insured depository                  (CPMI) and the Board of the
                                               provides guidance to examiners in                       institutions.                                         International Organization of Securities
                                               reviewing financial institutions and                                                                          Commissions (IOSCO) released
                                               services provided by third parties.                     b. FFIEC Cybersecurity Assessment Tool                ‘‘Guidance on cyber resilience for
                                               Certain booklets, such as the Business                     In June 2015, the FFIEC issued the                 financial market infrastructures.’’ 6
                                               Continuity Planning booklet and the                     Cybersecurity Assessment Tool                         According to CPMI and IOSCO, the
                                               Information Security booklet,                           (Assessment) as a voluntary self-                     guidance ‘‘aims to add momentum to
                                               incorporate the agencies’ expectations                  assessment tool that financial                        and instill international consistency in
                                               regarding cybersecurity risk                            institutions, including covered entities,             the industry’s ongoing efforts to
                                               management. The IT Handbook also                        may use to help assess their cyber risks              enhance FMIs’ ability to preempt cyber-
                                               includes work programs that an                          and determine their cybersecurity                     attacks, respond rapidly and effectively
                                               examiner may use to aid in assessing a                  preparedness.                                         to them, and achieve faster and safer
                                               company’s URSIT rating. IT Handbook                        The Assessment provides institutions               target recovery objectives if they
                                               guidance would continue to be used for                  with a repeatable and measurable                      succeed.’’ 7 The guidance is intended to
                                               covered entities to assess IT risk                      process to determine whether the                      supplement the CPMI–IOSCO Principles
                                               management.                                             institutions have appropriate controls                for Financial Market Infrastructures
                                                  In 1999, Title V, Subtitle A of the                  and risk management in place relative to              (PFMI) and is ‘‘not intended to impose
                                               Gramm-Leach-Bliley Act (GLBA) 3                         the inherent risk profile of the                      additional standards on FMIs beyond
                                               required that each agency establish                     institution. The Assessment                           those set out in the PFMI, but provides
                                               appropriate administrative, technical,                  incorporates baseline cybersecurity-                  detail related to the preparations and
                                               and physical controls for the                           related categories from the FFIEC IT                  measures that FMIs should undertake to
                                               safeguarding of financial institutions’                 Handbook, as well as key concepts from                enhance their cyber resilience
                                               customer information. In 2000, the                      the National Institute of Standards and               capabilities with the objective of
                                               agencies published the Interagency                      Technology (NIST) Cybersecurity                       limiting the escalating risks that cyber
                                               Guidelines Establishing Information                     Framework (CSF) and other industry                    threats pose to financial stability.’’ 8 The
                                               Security Standards (Guidelines)                         best practices. However, the Assessment               agencies reviewed the CPMI–IOSCO
                                               implementing the GLBA safeguarding                      does not establish binding minimum                    guidance and took it into consideration
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                                                                                                       standards.                                            as they developed the proposed
                                                 1 64 FR 3109, January 20, 1999.                                                                             enhanced standards described in this
                                                 2 The  agencies have statutory authority to             4 See 12 CFR part 208, App. D–2 and 12 CFR part
                                                                                                                                                             ANPR.
                                               supervise and examine services provided by third-       225, App. F (Board); 12 CFR 30, App. B (OCC); and
                                               party service providers to regulated financial          12 CFR part 364, App. B and 12 CFR part 391,
                                                                                                                                                               6 See http://www.bis.org/cpmi/publ/d146.pdf.
                                               institutions under the Bank Service Company Act         subpart B, App. B (FDIC).
                                               (12 U.S.C. 1867(c)).                                      5 See 12 CFR part 30, App. A and D, 12 CFR part       7 See http://www.bis.org/cpmi/publ/d146.htm.
                                                 3 15 U.S.C. 6801–6809.                                208, App. D–1, 12 CFR part 225, App. F.                 8 See http://www.bis.org/cpmi/publ/d146.pdf.




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                                               74318                Federal Register / Vol. 81, No. 207 / Wednesday, October 26, 2016 / Proposed Rules

                                               e. Interagency Paper on Sound Practices                 Board pursuant to section 165 of the                  application of the standards regardless
                                               To Strengthen the Resilience of the U.S.                Dodd-Frank Wall Street Reform and                     of whether a depository institution or its
                                               Financial System                                        Consumer Protection Act (Dodd-Frank                   affiliate conducted the operation itself,
                                                  In April 2003, the Board, the OCC,                   Act), which directs the Board to                      or whether it engaged a third-party
                                               and the Securities and Exchange                         establish enhanced prudential                         service provider to conduct the
                                               Commission issued the Interagency                       standards, including overall risk                     operation. Direct application of the
                                               Paper on Sound Practices to Strengthen                  management standards, for these                       standards to these service providers
                                               the Resilience of the U.S. Financial                    entities.12 Similarly, the Board is                   could have potential benefits, including
                                               System (Sound Practices Paper).9 The                    considering applying the standards to                 facilitating supervisory action in the
                                               Sound Practices Paper focuses on                        financial market utilities designated by              event that a covered service was not
                                               minimizing the immediate systemic                       FSOC (designated FMUs) for which the                  meeting a proposed standard and
                                               effects of a wide-scale disruption on                   Board is the Supervisory Agency                       establishing an obligation for meeting
                                               critical financial markets and on                       pursuant to sections 805 and 810 of the               the standard on the depository
                                                                                                       Dodd-Frank Act; other FMIs over which                 institution or its affiliate, as well as on
                                               establishing the appropriate back-up
                                                                                                       the Board has primary (not backup)                    the third-party provider of the covered
                                               capacity for recovery and resumption of
                                                                                                       supervisory authority because the FMIs                service. The Board also is considering
                                               clearance and settlement activities in
                                                                                                       are members of the Federal Reserve                    requiring nonbank financial companies
                                               wholesale financial markets. As
                                                                                                       System; and FMIs that are operated by                 and Board-supervised FMIs to verify
                                               discussed in sections IV and VI, the
                                                                                                       the Federal Reserve Banks (collectively               that any services the nonbank financial
                                               agencies took the Sound Practices Paper
                                                                                                       referred to as ‘‘Board-supervised                     company or Board-supervised FMI
                                               into consideration as they developed the
                                                                                                       FMIs’’).13                                            receives from third parties are subject to
                                               proposed enhanced standards described                      The OCC is considering applying the                the same standards that would apply if
                                               in this ANPR.                                           standards to any national bank, federal               the services were being conducted by
                                               III. Scope of Application                               savings association (and any                          the nonbank financial company or
                                                  The agencies are considering applying                subsidiaries thereof), or federal branch              Board-supervised FMI itself.
                                                                                                       of a foreign bank that is a subsidiary of                Other financial entities, including
                                               the enhanced standards to certain
                                                                                                       a bank holding company or savings and                 community banks that are not covered
                                               entities with total consolidated assets of
                                                                                                       loan holding company with total                       entities, would continue to be subject to
                                               $50 billion or more on an enterprise-
                                                                                                       consolidated assets of $50 billion or                 existing guidance, standards, and
                                               wide basis. A cyber-attack or disruption
                                                                                                       more, or any national bank, federal                   examinations related to the provision of
                                               at one or more of these entities could
                                                                                                       savings association, or federal branch of             banking services by third parties.
                                               have a significant impact on the safety
                                                                                                       a foreign bank that has total
                                               and soundness of the entity, other                                                                            Questions on the Scope of Application
                                                                                                       consolidated assets of $50 billion or
                                               financial entities, and the U.S. financial                                                                       1. How should the agencies consider
                                                                                                       more that does not have a parent
                                               sector. The agencies are considering                                                                          broadening or narrowing the scope of
                                                                                                       holding company. The Board is
                                               applying the enhanced standards to                                                                            entities to which the proposed
                                                                                                       considering applying the standards to
                                               these entities on an enterprise-wide                                                                          standards would apply? What, if any,
                                                                                                       any state member bank (and any
                                               basis because cyber risks in one part of                                                                      alternative size thresholds or measures
                                                                                                       subsidiaries thereof) that is a subsidiary
                                               an organization could expose other parts                                                                      of risk to the safety and soundness of
                                                                                                       of a bank holding company with total
                                               of the organization to harm.                                                                                  the financial sector and the U.S.
                                                  Each agency would apply these                        consolidated assets of $50 billion or
                                                                                                       more, and to any state member bank that               economy should the agencies consider
                                               standards to large institutions subject to                                                                    in determining the scope of application
                                               their jurisdiction.10 Thus, the Board is                has total consolidated assets of $50
                                                                                                       billion or more that is not a subsidiary              of the standards? For example, should
                                               considering applying the enhanced                                                                             ‘‘covered entity’’ be defined according to
                                               standards on an enterprise-wide basis to                of a bank holding company. The FDIC
                                                                                                       is considering applying the standards to              the number of connections an entity
                                               all U.S. bank holding companies with                                                                          (including its service providers) has to
                                               total consolidated assets of $50 billion                any state nonmember bank or state
                                                                                                       savings association (and any                          other entities in the financial sector,
                                               or more, the U.S. operations of foreign                                                                       rather than asset size? If so, how should
                                               banking organizations with total U.S.                   subsidiaries thereof) that is a subsidiary
                                                                                                       of a bank holding company or savings                  the agencies define ‘‘connections’’ for
                                               assets of $50 billion or more, and all                                                                        this purpose?
                                               U.S. savings and loan holding                           and loan holding company with total
                                                                                                       consolidated assets of $50 billion or                    2. What are the costs and benefits of
                                               companies with total consolidated                                                                             applying the standards to covered
                                               assets of $50 billion or more.11 In this                more. Additionally, the FDIC is
                                                                                                       considering applying the standards to                 entities on an enterprise-wide basis? If
                                               regard, the proposed standards would                                                                          the agencies were to consider exempting
                                               apply to subsidiaries of depository                     any state nonmember bank or state
                                                                                                       savings association that has total                    certain subsidiaries within a covered
                                               institution holding companies (other                                                                          entity from the standards, what criteria
                                               than depository institutions supervised                 consolidated assets of $50 billion or
                                                                                                       more that does not have a parent                      should be used to assess any such
                                               by the OCC and FDIC) in view of the                                                                           exemptions? What safeguards should
                                               subsidiaries’ potential to act as points of             holding company.
                                                                                                          As noted, the agencies are considering             the agencies require from a subsidiary
                                               cyber vulnerability to the covered                                                                            seeking to be exempted from the
                                                                                                       whether to apply the standards to third-
                                               entities. The Board is also considering                                                                       standards to ensure that an exempted
                                                                                                       party service providers with respect to
                                               applying the standards to nonbank                                                                             subsidiary does not expose the covered
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                                                                                                       services provided to depository
                                               financial companies supervised by the                                                                         entity to material cyber risk?
                                                                                                       institutions and their affiliates that are
                                                                                                       covered entities (covered services). This                3. What, if any, special considerations
                                                  9 Available at: http://www.sec.gov/news/studies/
                                                                                                       would ensure consistent, direct                       should be made regarding application of
                                               34–47638.htm.
                                                  10 12 U.S.C. 321, 1818, 1831p-1 (Board); 12 U.S.C.
                                                                                                                                                             the standards to savings and loan
                                               1, 93a, 161, 481, 1463, 1464, 1818, 1831p-1, 3901,        12 12U.S.C. 5365.                                   holding companies that engage
                                               3909 (OCC); 12 U.S.C. 1818, 1819, 1831p-1 (FDIC).         13 12U.S.C. 5464(a), 5469; 12 U.S.C. 330, 1818,     significantly in insurance or commercial
                                                  11 12 U.S.C. 1467a(g), 5365.                         1831a; 12 U.S.C. 248(j).                              activities?


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                                                                   Federal Register / Vol. 81, No. 207 / Wednesday, October 26, 2016 / Proposed Rules                                          74319

                                                 4. What are the most effective ways to                elements of the financial system from                 critical systems, such as substitutability
                                               ensure that services provided by third-                 serious new risks posed in the post-                  and interconnectedness. Systems that
                                               party service providers to covered                      September 11 environment. In the                      provide key functionality to the
                                               entities are performed in such a manner                 Sound Practices Paper, ‘‘critical                     financial sector for which alternatives
                                               as to minimize cyber risk? What are the                 financial markets’’ are defined as the                are limited or nonexistent, or would
                                               advantages and disadvantages of                         markets for federal funds, foreign                    take excessive time to implement (for
                                               applying the standards to services by                   exchange, and commercial paper; U.S.                  example, due to incompatibility) also
                                               requiring covered entities to maintain                  Government and agency securities; and                 could have a material impact on
                                               appropriate service agreements or                       corporate debt and equity securities.                 financial stability if significantly
                                               otherwise receive services only from                    The Sound Practices Paper further                     disrupted. Systems that act as key nodes
                                               third-party service providers that meet                 provides: ‘‘firms that play significant               to the financial sector due to their
                                               the standards with regard to the services               roles in critical financial markets are               extensive interconnectedness to other
                                               provided, rather than applying the                      those that participate (on behalf of                  financial entities could have a material
                                               requirements directly to third-party                    themselves or their customers) with                   impact on financial stability if
                                               service providers?                                      sufficient market share in one or more                significantly disrupted.
                                                 5. What are the advantages and                        critical financial markets such that their               Consistent with the approach to other
                                               disadvantages of applying the standards                 failure to settle their own or their                  services, any services provided by third
                                               directly to service providers to covered                customers’ material pending                           parties that support a covered entity’s
                                               entities? What challenges would such an                 transactions by the end of the business               sector-critical systems would be subject
                                               approach pose?                                          day could present systemic risk. While                to the same sector-critical standards.
                                                 6. What factors are most important in                 there are different ways to gauge the
                                               determining an appropriate balance                      significance of such firms in critical                Questions on Sector-Critical Systems
                                               between protecting the safety and                       markets, as a guideline, the agencies                    7. Do covered entities currently have
                                               soundness of the financial sector                       consider a firm significant in a                      access to sufficient information to
                                               through the possible application of the                 particular critical market if it                      determine whether any of their systems
                                               standards and the implementation                        consistently clears or settles at least five          would be considered sector-critical
                                               burden and costs associated with                        percent of the value of transactions in               systems for the purpose of the
                                               implementing the standards?                             that critical market.’’                               standards? If not, what additional
                                                                                                          While the scope of the Sound                       information would be necessary for an
                                               IV. Sector-Critical Systems
                                                                                                       Practices Paper was limited to the                    entity to identify whether it has one or
                                                  The financial sector operates through                resumption of clearance and settlement
                                               a network of interrelated markets and                                                                         more sector-critical systems for the
                                                                                                       activities in wholesale financial                     purposes of the standards?
                                               financial participants. As a result, a                  markets, the definitions presented in the
                                               technology failure or cyber-attack at one                                                                        8. What are the advantages and
                                                                                                       Sound Practices Paper provide a starting
                                               covered entity could have wide-ranging                                                                        disadvantages of requiring covered
                                                                                                       point for identifying systems (that is,
                                               effects on the safety and soundness of                                                                        entities to identify and report to the
                                                                                                       sector-critical systems) that should be
                                               other financial entities, both within and               subject to the more stringent, sector-                agencies their systems that support
                                               outside the United States. While this                   critical standards. Thus, consistent with             operations and meet the applicable
                                               interconnectedness warrants                             the Sound Practices Paper, the agencies               thresholds to be considered sector-
                                               comprehensive cyber risk management                     are considering whether systems that                  critical systems? Alternatively, what are
                                               by all financial market participants, it is             support the clearing or settlement of at              the advantages and disadvantages of
                                               especially important in the case of                     least five percent of the value of                    having the agencies develop a process to
                                               covered entities with sector-critical                   transactions (on a consistent basis) in               identify the systems of covered entities
                                               systems.                                                one or more of the markets for federal                that support operations and meet the
                                                  Thus, the agencies are considering                   funds, foreign exchange, commercial                   applicable thresholds to be considered
                                               establishing a two-tiered approach, with                paper, U.S. Government and agency                     sector-critical systems and to notify
                                               the enhanced standards applying to all                  securities, and corporate debt and                    covered entities which of their systems
                                               systems of covered entities, and an                     equity securities, should be considered               would be subject to the sector-critical
                                               additional, higher set of expectations,                 sector-critical systems for the purpose of            standards?
                                               referred to in the ANPR as ‘‘sector-                    the sector-critical standards. The                       9. What thresholds for transaction
                                               critical standards,’’ applying to those                 agencies also are considering whether                 value in one or more critical financial
                                               systems of covered entities that are                    systems that support the clearing or                  markets should the agencies consider
                                               critical to the financial sector.                       settlement of at least five percent of the            for identifying sector-critical systems?
                                                  As discussed below in the ANPR, the                  value of transactions (on a consistent                Similarly, what, if any, additional
                                               agencies are proposing sector-critical                  basis) in other markets (for example,                 thresholds should the agencies consider
                                               standards in four of the five categories                exchange-traded and over-the-counter                  for identifying sector-critical systems
                                               of standards that would require covered                 derivatives), or that support the                     that could have a material impact on
                                               entities with sector-critical systems to                maintenance of a significant share (for               financial stability if disrupted? For
                                               substantially mitigate the risk of a                    example, five percent) of the total U.S.              example, how should the agencies
                                               disruption due to a cyber event to their                deposits or balances due from other                   identify systems that provide
                                               sector-critical systems.                                depository institutions in the United                 functionality to the financial sector and
                                                  Previously in the Sound Practices                                                                          for which alternatives are limited,
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                                                                                                       States, should be considered sector-
                                               Paper, the Board and the OCC, together                  critical systems.                                     nonexistent, or would take excessive
                                               with the Securities and Exchange                           Because a cyber event may impact the               time to implement? How should such
                                               Commission, introduced definitions of                   safety and soundness of multiple                      factors be weighted? Commenters are
                                               ‘‘critical financial markets’’ and ‘‘firms              financial participants and create                     encouraged to provide quantitative as
                                               that play significant roles in critical                 systemic risk beyond these specific                   well as qualitative support and analysis
                                               financial markets,’’ which emphasized                   markets, the agencies are considering                 for proposed alternative methodologies,
                                               the need to protect the most critical                   additional factors to identify sector-                thresholds and/or factors.


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                                               74320                Federal Register / Vol. 81, No. 207 / Wednesday, October 26, 2016 / Proposed Rules

                                                  10. What are the advantages and                        and implement strategies for cyber                         standards to covered entities is intended
                                               disadvantages of determining that a                       resilience and business continuity in the                  to include application of the enhanced
                                               covered entity which holds a substantial                  event of a disruption; establish                           standards to services provided to the
                                               amount of U.S. deposits and/or                            protocols for secure, immutable,                           covered entities, unless otherwise
                                               balances due from other depository                        transferable storage of critical records;                  specified. The proposed standards for
                                               institutions in the United States plays a                 and maintain continuing situational                        covered entities are described first;
                                               significant role in a critical financial                  awareness of their operational status                      additional proposed standards for
                                               market? At what level of activity should                  and cybersecurity posture on an                            sector-critical systems then are listed
                                               a covered entity’s systems related to                     enterprise-wide basis. The agencies are                    separately.
                                               holding U.S. deposits and/or balances                     considering establishing a two-tiered                      Category 1—Cyber Risk Governance
                                               due from other depository institutions in                 approach, with the proposed enhanced
                                               the United States be determined to be                     standards applying to all systems of                          A key aspect of cyber risk governance
                                               critical to the sector?                                   covered entities and an additional,                        is developing and maintaining a formal
                                                  11. What factors should the agencies                   higher set of expectations, or ‘‘sector-                   cyber risk management strategy, as well
                                               consider in a measure of                                  critical standards,’’ applying to those                    as a supporting framework of policies
                                               interconnectedness resulting in a system                  systems of covered entities that are                       and procedures to implement the
                                               being determined as critical to the                       critical to the financial sector. The                      strategy, that is integrated into the
                                               financial sector, and how should such                     ‘‘sector-critical standards’’ would                        overall strategic plans and risk
                                                                                                         require covered entities to substantially                  governance structures of covered
                                               factors be weighted? Commenters are
                                                                                                         mitigate the risk of a disruption due to                   entities. Therefore, the agencies are
                                               asked to provide quantitative as well as
                                                                                                         a cyber event to their sector-critical                     considering standards under the cyber
                                               qualitative support and analysis for
                                                                                                         systems.                                                   risk governance category that would be
                                               proposed alternative methodologies,
                                                                                                            As noted, the standards would be                        similar to the governance standards
                                               thresholds and/or factors.
                                                                                                         organized into five categories:                            generally expected for large, complex
                                                  12. In some cases, entities, such as                                                                              financial organizations.15 For example,
                                               smaller banking organizations, may                           Category 1: Cyber risk governance;
                                                                                                            Category 2: Cyber risk management;                      the standards would provide that the
                                               provide services considered sector-                                                                                  board of directors, or an appropriate
                                                                                                            Category 3: Internal dependency
                                               critical services either directly to the                                                                             board committee,16 of a covered entity
                                                                                                         management;
                                               financial sector or through covered                                                                                  must be responsible for approving the
                                                                                                            Category 4: External dependency
                                               entities. What criteria should the
                                                                                                         management; and
                                               agencies use to evaluate whether a                           Category 5: Incident response, cyber                       15 For OCC-regulated covered entities, see 12 CFR
                                               financial entity that would not                           resilience, and situational awareness.                     part 30 Appendix D. An OCC-regulated covered
                                               otherwise be subject to the enhanced                         The term ‘‘internal dependency’’ in
                                                                                                                                                                    entity would be expected to incorporate its cyber
                                               standards should be subject to the                                                                                   risk management strategy and framework into its
                                                                                                         this ANPR refers to the business assets                    overall risk management framework required
                                               sector-critical standards? How should                     (i.e., workforce, data, technology, and                    pursuant to the ‘‘OCC Guidelines Establishing
                                               the agencies weigh the costs of imposing                  facilities) of a covered entity upon                       Heightened Standards for Certain Large Insured
                                               the sector-critical standards to such                     which such entity depends to deliver
                                                                                                                                                                    National Banks, Insured Federal Savings
                                               smaller banking organizations against                                                                                Associations, and Insured Federal Branches’’ set
                                                                                                         services, as well as the information                       forth at 12 CFR part 30 Appendix D. These OCC
                                               the potential benefits to the financial                   flows and interconnections among those                     guidelines establish minimum standards for the
                                               system?                                                   assets. The term ‘‘external dependency’’                   design and implementation of a risk governance
                                                                                                                                                                    framework for large insured national banks, insured
                                               V. Enhanced Cyber Risk Management                         refers to an entity’s relationships with                   federal savings associations, and insured federal
                                               Standards                                                 outside vendors, suppliers, customers,                     branches of foreign banks. Among other items, the
                                                                                                         utilities (such as power and                               OCC guidelines state that the board of directors of
                                                  As noted, the agencies are considering                 telecommunications), and other external                    a covered bank should require management to
                                               enhanced cyber risk management                            organizations and service providers that
                                                                                                                                                                    establish and implement an effective framework
                                               standards for covered entities to                                                                                    that complies with the guidelines and approve any
                                                                                                         the covered entity depends on to deliver                   significant changes to the framework; the board
                                               increase the entities’ operational                        services, as well as the information                       should actively oversee a covered bank’s risk-taking
                                               resilience and reduce the potential                       flows and interconnections between the                     activities and hold management accountable for
                                               impact on the financial system as a                       entity and those external parties.
                                                                                                                                                                    adhering to the framework; and each covered bank
                                               result of, for example, a cyber-attack at                                                                            should have a comprehensive written statement
                                                                                                            The categories are organized in this                    that articulates the bank’s risk appetite and serves
                                               a firm or the failure to implement                        order to emphasize the core cyber risk                     as a basis for the framework (i.e., a risk appetite
                                               appropriate cyber risk management.                        governance and cyber risk management                       statement). The OCC guidelines set forth roles and
                                                  The enhanced standards would                                                                                      responsibilities for front line units, independent
                                                                                                         standards the agencies would expect a                      risk management, and internal audit. A Board-
                                               emphasize the need for covered entities                   covered entity to develop to establish a                   regulated covered entity would be expected to
                                               to demonstrate effective cyber risk                       foundation for making informed risk-                       incorporate its cyber risk management strategy and
                                               governance; continuously monitor and                      based decisions in support of its                          framework into its overall corporate strategy and
                                               manage their cyber risk within the risk                                                                              the institutional risk appetite maintained by the
                                                                                                         business objectives. Standards in the                      entity’s board of directors. See SR letter 12–17,
                                               appetite and tolerance levels approved                    internal dependency management,                            ‘‘Consolidated Supervision Framework for Large
                                               by their boards of directors; 14 establish                external dependency management, and                        Financial Institutions,’’ which outlines the general
                                                                                                         incident response, cyber resilience, and                   supervisory expectation that large bank holding
                                                  14 With regard to providers of services, depending                                                                companies and nonbank financial companies
                                                                                                         situational awareness categories are                       maintain a clearly articulated corporate strategy and
                                               on the size and structure of the organization and the
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                                               relative size of the unit providing services to a         designed to work together and to be                        institutional risk appetite; see also 12 CFR part 252,
                                               depository institution, its subsidiaries or affiliates,   mutually reinforcing.                                      subparts D and O, which establishes risk
                                               it may be appropriate for some functions to be               In the discussion of the individual                     management requirements for certain large bank
                                               performed by business line executive management           enhanced standards that follows, a                         holding companies and nonbank financial
                                               instead of the board of directors or a board                                                                         companies.
                                               committee of the organization. For these firms,
                                                                                                         reference to application of the enhanced                      16 In the discussion of the enhanced standards

                                               ‘‘enterprise-wide,’’ for purposes of the ANPR,                                                                       that follows, a reference to the board of directors
                                               encompasses the governance processes, policies,           performance of services by a third party for a             is intended to include the board of directors or an
                                               procedures, and controls related to or impacting the      depository institution, its subsidiaries, or affiliates.   appropriate board committee.



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                                                                   Federal Register / Vol. 81, No. 207 / Wednesday, October 26, 2016 / Proposed Rules                                           74321

                                               entity’s cyber risk management strategy                 ability to provide credible challenge to              Category 2—Cyber Risk Management
                                               and holding senior management                           management in matters related to                         In general, the enhanced standards
                                               accountable for establishing and                        cybersecurity and the evaluation of                   would require covered entities, to the
                                               implementing appropriate policies                       cyber risks and resilience.                           greatest extent possible and consistent
                                               consistent with the strategy.                              The agencies also are considering                  with their organizational structure, to
                                                  Specifically, the agencies are
                                                                                                       requiring senior leaders with                         integrate cyber risk management into
                                               considering, as an enhanced standard in
                                                                                                       responsibility for cyber risk oversight to            the responsibilities of at least three
                                               this category, a requirement that
                                                                                                       be independent of business line                       independent functions (such as the
                                               covered entities develop a written,
                                                                                                       management. In this regard, these senior              three lines of defense risk-management
                                               board-approved, enterprise-wide cyber
                                                                                                       leaders would need to have direct,                    model) with appropriate checks and
                                               risk management strategy that is
                                                                                                       independent access to the board of                    balances. This would allow covered
                                               incorporated into the overall business
                                                                                                       directors and would independently                     entities to more accurately and
                                               strategy and risk management of the
                                                                                                       inform the board of directors on an                   effectively identify, monitor, measure,
                                               firm.17 The strategy would articulate
                                                                                                       ongoing basis of the firm’s cyber risk                manage, and report on cyber risk.
                                               how the entity intends to address its
                                               inherent cyber risk (that is, its cyber risk            exposure and risk management                          Business Units
                                               before mitigating controls or other                     practices, including known and
                                                                                                       emerging issues and trends.                              The agencies are considering
                                               factors are taken into consideration) and                                                                     requiring units responsible for the day-
                                               how the entity would maintain an                           A covered entity would be required to              to-day business functions of a covered
                                               acceptable level of residual cyber risk                 establish an enterprise-wide cyber risk               entity to assess, on an ongoing basis, the
                                               (that is, its remaining cyber risk after                management framework that would                       cyber risks associated with the activities
                                               mitigating controls and other factors                   include policies and reporting                        of the business unit. Business units also
                                               have been taken into consideration) and                 structures to support and implement the               would need to ensure that information
                                               maintain resilience on an ongoing basis.                entity’s cyber risk management strategy.              regarding those risks is shared with
                                                  A covered entity also would be                       The entity would be required to include               senior management, including the chief
                                               required to establish cyber risk                        in its framework delineated cyber risk                executive officer (CEO), as appropriate,
                                               tolerances consistent with the firm’s risk              management and oversight                              in a timely manner so that senior
                                               appetite and strategy, and manage cyber                 responsibilities for the organization,                management can address and respond to
                                               risk appropriate to the nature of the                   including reporting structures and                    emerging cyber risks and cyber
                                               operations of the firm. Thus, as part of                expectations for independent risk                     incidents as they develop.
                                               the enhanced standard in this category,                 management, internal control, and                        As part of this proposed enhanced
                                               the agencies are considering requiring                  internal audit personnel; established                 standard, business units would be
                                               the entity’s board of directors to review               mechanisms for evaluating whether the                 required to adhere to procedures and
                                               and approve the enterprise-wide cyber                   organization has sufficient resources to              processes necessary to comply with the
                                               risk appetite and tolerances of the                     address the cyber risks facing the                    covered entity’s cyber risk management
                                               covered entity. The enhanced standard
                                                                                                       organization; and established policies                framework. Such procedures and
                                               also would provide that a covered entity
                                                                                                       for addressing any resource shortfalls or             processes would be designed to ensure
                                               must reduce its residual cyber risk to
                                                                                                       knowledge gaps. The entity also would                 that the applicable business unit’s cyber
                                               the appropriate level approved by the
                                                                                                       be required to include in its cyber risk              risk is effectively identified, measured,
                                               board of directors.
                                                  Covered entities would need to be                    management framework mechanisms for                   monitored, and controlled, consistent
                                               able to identify and assess those                       identifying and responding to cyber                   with the covered entity’s risk appetite
                                               activities and exposures that present                   incidents and threats, as well as                     and tolerances. Business units would
                                               cyber risk, then determine ways to                      procedures for testing the effectiveness              assess the cyber risks and potential
                                               aggregate them to assess the entity’s                   of the entity’s cybersecurity protocols               vulnerabilities associated with every
                                               residual cyber risk. This is important                  and updating them as the threat                       business asset (that is, their workforce,
                                               because cyber risk has the potential to                 landscape evolves.                                    data, technology, and facilities), service,
                                               produce losses large enough to threaten                                                                       and IT connection point for the
                                                                                                       Questions on Cyber Risk Governance                    respective unit, and update these
                                               an entity’s financial health, its
                                               reputation, or its ability to maintain core               13. How would a covered entity                      assessments as threats, technology, and
                                               operations if faced with a material cyber               determine that it is managing cyber risk              processes evolve. To this end, the
                                               event.                                                  consistent with its stated risk appetite              covered entity would be expected to
                                                  The board of directors of a covered                  and tolerances? What other                            ensure that business units maintain, or
                                               entity would oversee and hold senior                                                                          have access to, resources and staff with
                                                                                                       implementation challenges does
                                               management accountable for                                                                                    the skill sets needed to comply with the
                                                                                                       managing cyber risk consistent with a
                                               implementing the entity’s cyber risk                                                                          unit’s cybersecurity responsibilities.
                                                                                                       covered entity’s risk appetite and
                                               management framework. In this regard,                   tolerances present?                                   Independent Risk Management
                                               the agencies are considering requiring                    14. What are the incremental costs                    The agencies are considering a
                                               the board of directors to have adequate                 and benefits of establishing the                      requirement that covered entities
                                               expertise in cybersecurity or to maintain
                                                                                                       contemplated standards for the roles,                 incorporate enterprise-wide cyber risk
                                               access to resources or staff with such
                                                                                                       responsibilities, and adequate                        management into the responsibilities of
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                                               expertise. Consistent with existing
                                                                                                       cybersecurity expertise (or access to                 an independent risk management
                                               agency expectations, the enhanced
                                                                                                       adequate cybersecurity expertise) of the              function. This function would report to
                                               standards would require the board of
                                                                                                       board of directors? To what extent do                 the covered entity’s chief risk officer
                                               directors to have and maintain the
                                                                                                       covered entities already have                         and board of directors, as appropriate,
                                                  17 For Board-regulated covered entities, this
                                                                                                       governance structures in place that are               regarding implementation of the firm’s
                                               would be part of the larger global risk management      broadly consistent with the proposed                  cyber risk management framework
                                               framework that is required by 12 CFR 252.33.            cyber risk governance standards?                      throughout the organization.


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                                               74322               Federal Register / Vol. 81, No. 207 / Wednesday, October 26, 2016 / Proposed Rules

                                               Independent risk management would be                    independence, stature, authority,                     directors and, if warranted, the
                                               required to analyze cyber risk at the                   resources, and access to the board of                 frequency with which such reports
                                               enterprise level to identify and ensure                 directors to ensure that the operations of            should be made to various levels of
                                               effective response to events with the                   the entity are consistent with the cyber              management. What policies do covered
                                               potential to impact one or multiple                     risk management framework. The                        entities currently follow in reporting
                                               operating units. Additionally,                          reporting lines must be clear and                     material cyber risks and vulnerabilities
                                               independent risk management would be                    separate from those for other operations              to the CEO and board of directors?
                                               continually required to assess the firm’s               and business units.                                      16. The agencies seek comment on
                                               overall exposure to cyber risk and                                                                            requiring covered entities to organize
                                                                                                       Audit Function                                        themselves in a manner that is
                                               promptly notify the CEO and board of
                                               directors, as appropriate, when its                        Audit evaluates the effectiveness of               consistent with the contemplated
                                               assessment of a particular cyber risk                   risk management, internal controls, and               enhanced standards for cyber risk
                                               differs from that of a business unit, as                governance processes, among other                     management. Besides the approach
                                               well as of any instances when a unit of                 things, and advises management and the                outlined in the ANPR, what other
                                               the covered entity has exceeded the                     board of directors on whether a covered               approaches could ensure that entities
                                               entity’s established cyber risk                         entity’s policies and procedures are                  are effectively identifying, monitoring,
                                               tolerances.                                             adequate to keep up with emerging risks               measuring, managing, and reporting on
                                                  On a continuous basis, independent                   and industry regulations. As such, audit              cyber risk?
                                               risk management would be required to                    plays an important role in risk
                                                                                                       management, internal control, and                     Category 3—Internal Dependency
                                               identify, measure, and monitor cyber
                                                                                                       corporate governance.                                 Management
                                               risk across the enterprise, and to
                                               determine whether cyber risk controls                      Consistent with a strong overall                      Standards within the internal
                                               are appropriately in place across the                   governance process, the agencies                      dependency management category are
                                               enterprise consistent with the entity’s                 consider cyber risk and cyber risk                    intended to ensure that covered entities
                                               established risk appetite and tolerances.               management as important to the internal               have effective capabilities in place to
                                               On an ongoing basis, the independent                    audit function at covered entities.                   identify and manage cyber risks
                                               risk management function would be                       Therefore, the agencies are considering               associated with their business assets
                                               required to identify and assess the                     explicitly requiring the audit function to            (that is, their workforce, data,
                                               covered entity’s material aggregate risks               assess whether the cyber risk                         technology, and facilities) throughout
                                               and determine whether actions need to                   management framework of a covered                     their lifespans. These risks may arise
                                               be taken to strengthen risk management                  entity complies with applicable laws                  from a wide range of sources, including
                                               or reduce risk given changes in the                     and regulations and is appropriate for                insider threats, data transmission errors,
                                               covered entity’s risk profile or other                  its size, complexity, interconnectedness,             or the use of legacy systems acquired
                                               conditions, placing particular emphasis                 and risk profile.                                     through a merger.
                                               on sector-critical systems.                                Further, as part of this enhanced                     A key aspect of the internal
                                                  Additionally, the agencies are                       standard, audit would be required to                  dependency management category is
                                               considering requiring covered entities to               incorporate an assessment of cyber risk               ensuring that covered entities
                                               assess the completeness, effectiveness,                 management into the overall audit plan                continually assess and improve, as
                                               and timeliness with which they reduce                   of the covered entity. The plan would be              necessary, their effectiveness in
                                               the aggregate residual cyber risk of their              required to provide for an evaluation of              reducing the cyber risks associated with
                                               systems to the appropriate, board-of-                   the adequacy of compliance with the                   internal dependencies on an enterprise-
                                               directors approved level. The Board is                  board-approved cyber risk management                  wide basis. As part of the overall cyber
                                               considering requiring covered entities,                 framework and cyber risk policies,                    risk management strategy, as discussed
                                               at the holding company level, to                        procedures, and processes established                 in the cyber risk governance section of
                                               measure (quantitatively) the                            by the firm’s business units or                       this ANPR, the agencies are considering
                                               completeness, effectiveness, and                        independent risk management. Such an                  a requirement that a covered entity
                                               timeliness with which they reduce the                   evaluation would be required to include               integrate an internal dependency
                                               aggregate residual cyber risk of their                  the entire security lifecycle, including              management strategy into the entity’s
                                               systems to the appropriate, board-of-                   penetration testing and other                         overall strategic risk management plan.
                                               directors approved level. As noted, this                vulnerability assessment activities as                The strategy would guide and inform
                                               is important because cyber risk has the                 appropriate based on the size,                        measures taken to reduce cyber risks
                                               potential to produce losses large enough                complexity, scope of operations, and                  associated with a covered entity’s
                                               to threaten an entity’s financial health,               interconnectedness of the covered                     internal dependencies. The internal
                                               its reputation, or its ability to maintain              entity. The audit plan would be                       dependency management strategy
                                               core operations if faced with a material                required to provide for an assessment of              would be designed to ensure that: Roles
                                               cyber event.                                            the business unit and independent risk                and responsibilities for internal
                                                  Therefore, the independent risk                      management functions’ capabilities to                 dependency management are well
                                               management function would be                            adapt as appropriate and remain in                    defined; policies, standards, and
                                               required to establish and maintain an                   compliance with the covered entity’s                  procedures to identify and manage
                                               up-to-date understanding of the                         cyber risk management framework and                   cyber risks associated with internal
                                               structure of a covered entity’s                         within its stated risk appetite and                   assets, including those connected to or
                                               cybersecurity programs and supporting                                                                         supporting sector-critical systems, are
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                                                                                                       tolerances.
                                               processes and systems, as well as their                                                                       established and regularly updated
                                               relationships to the evolving cyber                     Questions on Cyber Risk Management                    throughout those assets’ lifespans;
                                               threat landscape.                                         15. The agencies seek comment on the                appropriate oversight is in place to
                                                  To satisfy these requirements, it is                 appropriateness of requiring covered                  monitor effectiveness in reducing cyber
                                               essential that a covered entity’s                       entities to regularly report data on                  risks associated with internal
                                               independent risk management function                    identified cyber risks and vulnerabilities            dependencies; and appropriate
                                               have and maintain sufficient                            directly to the CEO and board of                      compliance mechanisms are in place.


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                                                                   Federal Register / Vol. 81, No. 207 / Wednesday, October 26, 2016 / Proposed Rules                                          74323

                                                  Another key aspect of the internal                   exceptions and known violations to                    sub-contracting, onboarding, ongoing
                                               dependency management category is                       internal dependency cyber risk                        monitoring, change management, off
                                               having current and complete awareness                   management policies, standards, and                   boarding) are established and regularly
                                               of all internal assets and business                     procedures.                                           updated; appropriate metrics are in
                                               functions that support a firm’s cyber                      As part of this enhanced standard, the             place to measure effectiveness in
                                               risk management strategy. The agencies                  agencies are considering requiring                    reducing cyber risks associated with
                                               are considering a requirement that                      covered entities to continually apply                 external dependencies; and appropriate
                                               covered entities maintain an inventory                  appropriate controls to reduce the cyber              compliance mechanisms are in place.
                                               of all business assets on an enterprise-                risk of business assets to the enterprise                As part of an external dependency
                                               wide basis prioritized according to the                 and the financial sector to the board-                management strategy, the agencies are
                                               assets’ criticality to the business                     approved level. The agencies are also                 considering a requirement that covered
                                               functions they support, the firm’s                      considering a requirement that covered                entities establish effective policies,
                                               mission and the financial sector. Thus,                 entities periodically conduct tests of                plans, and procedures to identify and
                                               covered entities would be required to                   back-ups to business assets to achieve                manage real-time cyber risks associated
                                               maintain a current and complete listing                 resilience.                                           with external dependencies, particularly
                                               of all internal assets and business                                                                           those connected to or supporting sector-
                                                                                                       Category 4—External Dependency
                                               functions, including mappings to other                                                                        critical systems and operations,
                                                                                                       Management
                                               assets and other business functions,                                                                          throughout their lifespans.
                                               information flows, and                                    As noted, the term ‘‘external                          Another key aspect of the external
                                               interconnections. Covered entities                      dependencies’’ refers to an entity’s                  dependency management category is
                                               would track connections among assets                    relationships with outside vendors,                   having the ability to monitor in real
                                               and cyber risk levels throughout the life               suppliers, customers, utilities, and other            time all external dependencies and
                                               cycles of the assets and support relevant               external organizations and service                    trusted connections that support a
                                               data collection and analysis across the                 providers that the entity depends on to               covered entity’s cyber risk management
                                               organization. This would contribute to                  deliver services, as well as the                      strategy. The agencies are considering a
                                               establishing and implementing                           information flows and interconnections                requirement that covered entities have a
                                               mechanisms to prioritize monitoring,                    between the entity and those external                 current, accurate, and complete
                                               incident response, and recovery of                      parties. In addition, the external                    awareness of, and prioritize, all external
                                               systems critical to the entity and to the               dependency management category                        dependencies and trusted connections
                                               financial sector. A covered entity’s                    includes the management of                            enterprise-wide based on their
                                               tracking capability would need to                       interconnection risks associated with                 criticality to the business functions they
                                               enable timely notification of internal                  non-critical external parties that                    support, the firm’s mission, and the
                                               cyber risk management issues to                         maintain trusted connections to                       financial sector. Thus, covered entities
                                               designated internal stakeholders. In                    important systems. Standards within the               would be able to generate and maintain
                                               addition, covered entities would                        external dependency management                        a current, accurate, and complete listing
                                               support the reduction of the cyber risk                 category are intended to ensure that                  of all external dependencies and
                                               exposure of business assets to the                      covered entities have effective                       business functions, including mappings
                                               enterprise and the sector until the                     capabilities in place to identify and                 to supported assets and business
                                               board-approved risk appetite and                        manage cyber risks associated with their              functions. Covered entities would be
                                               tolerances are achieved; and support                    external dependencies and                             required to prioritize monitoring,
                                               timely responses to cyber threats to, and               interconnection risks throughout these                incident response, and recovery of
                                               vulnerabilities of, the enterprise and the              relationships.                                        systems critical to the enterprise and the
                                               financial sector.                                         A key aspect of the external                        financial sector; support the continued
                                                  Another key aspect within the                        dependency management category is                     reduction of the cyber risk exposure of
                                               internal dependency management                          ensuring that covered entities                        external dependencies to the enterprise
                                               category is establishing and applying                   continually assess and improve, as                    and the sector until the board-approved
                                               appropriate controls to address the                     necessary, their effectiveness in                     cyber risk appetite and tolerances are
                                               inherent cyber risk of a covered entity’s               reducing the cyber risks associated with              achieved; support timely responses to
                                               assets. The agencies are considering a                  external dependencies and                             cyber risks to the enterprise and the
                                               requirement that covered entities                       interconnection risks enterprise-wide.                sector; monitor the universe of external
                                               establish and apply appropriate controls                As part of the overall cyber risk                     dependencies that connect to assets
                                               to address the inherent cyber risk of                   management strategy, as discussed in                  supporting systems critical to the
                                               their assets (taking into account the                   the cyber risk governance section of this             enterprise and the sector; support
                                               prioritization of the entity’s business                 ANPR, the agencies are considering a                  relevant data collection and analysis
                                               assets and the cyber risks they pose to                 requirement that a covered entity                     across the organization; and track
                                               the entity) by:                                         integrate an external dependency                      connections among external
                                                  • Assessing the cyber risk of assets                 management strategy into the entity’s                 dependencies, organizational assets, and
                                               and their operating environments prior                  overall strategic risk management plan                cyber risk levels throughout their
                                               to deployment;                                          to address and reduce cyber risks                     lifespans. A covered entity’s tracking
                                                  • continually applying controls and                  associated with external dependencies                 capability would enable timely
                                               monitoring assets and their operating                   and interconnection risks. This external              notification of cyber risk management
                                               environments (including deviations                      dependency management strategy                        issues to designated stakeholders.
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                                               from baseline cybersecurity                             would ensure that roles and                              Another key aspect within the
                                               configurations) over the lifecycle of the               responsibilities for external dependency              external dependency management
                                               assets; and                                             management are well defined; policies,                category is establishing and applying
                                                  • assessing relevant cyber risks to the              standards, and procedures for external                appropriate controls to address the
                                               assets (including insider threats to                    dependency management throughout                      cyber risk presented by each external
                                               systems and data) and mitigating                        the lifespan of the relationship (for                 partner throughout the lifespan of the
                                               identified deviations, granted                          example, due diligence, contracting and               relationship. The agencies are


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                                               74324               Federal Register / Vol. 81, No. 207 / Wednesday, October 26, 2016 / Proposed Rules

                                               considering a requirement that covered                  functions in the face of cyber-attacks                data necessary to keep the institution
                                               entities analyze and address the cyber                  and continuously enhance their cyber                  operational.
                                               risks that emerge from reviews of their                 resilience. In addition, covered entities                In this category, the agencies also are
                                               external relationships, and identify and                would be required to establish processes              considering a requirement that covered
                                               periodically test alternative solutions in              designed to maintain effective                        entities establish and implement
                                               case an external partner fails to perform               situational awareness capabilities to                 strategies to meet the entity’s obligations
                                               as expected. As part of this requirement                reliably predict, analyze, and respond to             for performing core business functions
                                               and in order to address the rapidly                     changes in the operating environment.                 in the event of a disruption, including
                                               changing and complex threat landscape,                     The agencies are considering a                     the potential for multiple concurrent or
                                               the agencies are considering a                          requirement that covered entities                     widespread interruptions and cyber-
                                               requirement that covered entities                       establish and maintain effective                      attacks on multiple elements of
                                               continually apply and evaluate                          incident response and cyber resilience                interconnected critical infrastructure,
                                               appropriate controls to reduce the cyber                governance, strategies, and capacities                such as energy and telecommunications.
                                               risk of external dependencies to the                    that enable the organizations to                         The preservation of critical records in
                                               enterprise and the sector.                              anticipate, withstand, contain, and                   the event of a large-scale or significant
                                                                                                       rapidly recover from a disruption                     cyber event is essential to maintaining
                                               Questions on Internal and External                                                                            confidence in the banking system and to
                                               Dependency Management                                   caused by a significant cyber event. The
                                                                                                                                                             facilitating resolution or recovery
                                                                                                       agencies are considering a requirement
                                                  17. The agencies request comment on                                                                        processes after a catastrophic event. The
                                                                                                       that covered entities establish and
                                               the comprehensiveness and                                                                                     agencies are therefore considering
                                                                                                       implement plans to identify and
                                               effectiveness of the proposed standards                                                                       requiring covered entities to establish
                                                                                                       mitigate the cyber risks they pose
                                               for internal and external dependency                                                                          protocols for secure, immutable, off-line
                                                                                                       through interconnectedness to sector
                                               management in achieving the agencies’                                                                         storage of critical records, including
                                                                                                       partners and external stakeholders to
                                               objective of increasing the resilience of                                                                     financial records of the institution, loan
                                                                                                       prevent cyber contagion. In addition,
                                               covered entities, third-party service                                                                         data, asset management account
                                                                                                       the agencies are considering a
                                               providers to covered entities, and the                                                                        information, and daily deposit account
                                                                                                       requirement that covered entities
                                               financial sector.                                                                                             records, including balances and
                                                                                                       establish and maintain enterprise-wide                ownership details, formatted using
                                                  18. What challenges and burdens                      cyber resilience and incident response
                                               would covered entities encounter in                                                                           certain defined data standards to allow
                                                                                                       programs, based on their enterprise-                  for restoration of these records by
                                               maintaining an internal and external                    wide cyber risk management strategies
                                               dependency management strategy                                                                                another financial institution, service
                                                                                                       and supported by appropriate policies,                provider, or the FDIC in the event of
                                               consistent with that described by the                   procedures, governance, staffing, and
                                               agencies?                                                                                                     resolution.
                                                                                                       independent review. These cyber                          Transition plans are essential in the
                                                  19. How do the proposed internal and
                                                                                                       resilience and incident response                      event a service is terminated or an entity
                                               external dependency management
                                                                                                       programs would be required to include                 cannot meet its obligations. Thus, the
                                               standards compare with processes
                                                                                                       effective escalation protocols linked to              agencies are considering a requirement
                                               already in place at banking
                                                                                                       organizational decision levels, cyber                 that covered entities establish plans and
                                               organizations?
                                                  20. What other approaches could the                  contagion containment procedures,                     mechanisms to transfer business, where
                                               agencies use to evaluate a covered                      communication strategies, and                         feasible, to another entity or service
                                               entity’s internal and external                          processes to incorporate lessons learned              provider with minimal disruption and
                                               dependency management strategies?                       back into the program. Cyber resilience               within prescribed time frames if the
                                               Please be specific as to each approach.                 strategies and exercises would be                     original covered entity or service
                                                  21. How would the proposed                           required to consider wide-scale recovery              provider is unable to perform. As a
                                               standards for internal and external                     scenarios and be designed to achieve                  result, if performance is not feasible and
                                               dependency management impact a                          institutional resilience, support the                 contractual termination/remediation
                                               covered entity’s use of a third-party                   achievement of financial sector-wide                  provisions have been exercised, client
                                               service provider?                                       resilience, and minimize risks to or from             data would be returned to the original
                                                  22. What additional issues should the                interconnected parties.                               covered entity or service provider in a
                                               agencies consider related to internal                      The IT Handbook calls for examiners                method that is transferable to an
                                               and external dependency management                      to determine whether covered entities                 alternate entity or service provider with
                                               and the covered entities’ use of third-                 have established plans to address                     minimal disruption to the operations of
                                               party service providers? How should                     recovery and resilience strategies for                the covered entity.
                                               those issues be evaluated by the                        cyber-attacks that may disrupt access,                   Testing the cyber resilience of
                                               agencies? Please be specific.                           corrupt data, or destroy data or                      operations and services helps to identify
                                                                                                       systems.18 In addition to establishing                potential threats to the ongoing
                                               Category 5—Incident Response, Cyber                     recovery time objectives (RTOs),                      performance of the operation or service.
                                               Resilience, and Situational Awareness                   recovery and resilience strategies should             A prolonged disruption of a significant
                                                  Standards within the incident                        address the potential for malware or                  operation could generate systemic risk.
                                               response, cyber resilience, and                         corrupted data to replicate or propagate              The agencies are considering a
                                               situational awareness category would be                 through connected systems or high                     requirement that covered entities
                                               designed to ensure that covered entities                availability solutions. For cyber-attacks             conduct specific testing that addresses
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                                               plan for, respond to, contain, and                      that may potentially corrupt or destroy               disruptive, destructive, corruptive, or
                                               rapidly recover from disruptions caused                 critical data, recovery strategies should             any other cyber event that could affect
                                               by cyber incidents, thereby                             be designed to achieve recovery point                 their ability to service clients; and
                                               strengthening their cyber resilience as                 objectives based on the criticality of the            significant downtime that would
                                               well as that of the financial sector.                                                                         threaten the business resilience of
                                               Covered entities would be required to be                  18 FFIEC IT Examination Handbook, Business          clients. In addition, the agencies are
                                               capable of operating critical business                  Continuity Planning, Appendix J.                      considering a requirement that the


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                                                                    Federal Register / Vol. 81, No. 207 / Wednesday, October 26, 2016 / Proposed Rules                                            74325

                                               testing address external                                 capabilities? What factors should the                    Additionally, the Board is considering
                                               interdependencies, such as connectivity                  agencies consider essential in                        requiring Board-supervised covered
                                               to markets, payment systems, clearing                    considering a covered entity’s                        entities, at the holding company level,
                                               entities, messaging services, and other                  situational awareness capabilities?                   to measure (quantitatively) their ability
                                               critical service providers or partners;                     27. What other factors should be                   to reduce the aggregate residual cyber
                                               that the testing of cyber resilience be                  included within the incident response,                risk of their sector-critical systems and
                                               undertaken jointly where critical                        cyber resilience, and situational                     their ability to reduce such risk to a
                                               dependencies exist; and that the testing                 awareness category?                                   minimal level. Such measurement
                                               validate the effectiveness of internal and                  28. What additional requirements                   would take into account the risks
                                               external communication protocols with                    should the agencies consider to improve               associated with internal dependencies,
                                               stakeholders.                                            the resilience or situational awareness               external dependencies, and trusted
                                                 A key element of situational                           of a covered entity or the ability of a               connections with access to sector-
                                               awareness is the timely identification,                  covered entity to respond to a cyber-                 critical systems.
                                               analysis, and tracking of data about the                 attack?
                                               state of, and potential cyber risks to, the                                                                    Questions on Standards for Sector-
                                                                                                        VI. Standards for Sector-Critical                     Critical Systems of Covered Entities
                                               organization. The agencies are                           Systems of Covered Entities
                                               considering a requirement that covered                                                                            29. The agencies request comment on
                                               entities maintain an ongoing situational                    As noted, the agencies are considering             the appropriateness and feasibility of
                                               awareness of their operational status                    two tiers of standards, with more                     establishing a two-hour RTO for all
                                               and cybersecurity posture to pre-empt                    stringent standards to apply to systems               sector-critical systems. What would be
                                               cyber events and respond rapidly to                      of covered entities that are critical to the          the incremental costs to covered entities
                                               them. Covered entities also would be                     functioning of the financial sector.                  of moving toward a two-hour RTO
                                               required to establish and maintain                          In particular, the agencies are                    objective for these systems?
                                               threat profiles 19 for identified threats to             considering a requirement that covered                   30. What impact would a two-hour
                                               the firm; establish and maintain threat                  entities minimize the residual cyber risk             RTO have on covered entities’ use of
                                               modeling 20 capabilities; gather                         of sector-critical systems by                         third-party service providers? What
                                               actionable cyber threat intelligence and                 implementing the most effective,                      challenges or burdens would be
                                               perform security analytics on an                         commercially available controls.                      presented by the requirement of a two-
                                               ongoing basis; and establish and                         Minimizing residual cyber risk means                  hour RTO for covered entities who rely
                                               maintain capabilities for ongoing                        substantially mitigating the risk of a                on third-party service providers for their
                                               vulnerability management.                                disruption or failure due to a cyber                  critical systems? How should the
                                                                                                        event.                                                agencies weigh such costs against other
                                               Questions on Incident Response, Cyber                       As a second sector-critical standard,              costs associated with implementing the
                                               Resilience, and Situational Awareness                    the agencies are considering requiring                enhanced standards outlined in this
                                                  23. How well do the proposed                          covered entities to establish an RTO of               ANPR?
                                               standards for incident response, cyber                   two hours for their sector-critical                      31. How should the agencies
                                               resilience, and situational awareness                    systems, validated by testing, to recover             implement the two-hour RTO objective?
                                               address the safety and soundness of                      from a disruptive, corruptive, or                     For example, would an extended
                                               individual financial institutions and                    destructive cyber event. Testing                      implementation timeline help to
                                               potential systemic cyber risk to the                     programs would include a range of                     mitigate costs, and if so, what timeline
                                               financial sector, including with respect                 scenarios, including severe but                       would be reasonable?
                                               to the testing strategies and approaches?                plausible scenarios, and would                           32. Should different RTOs be set for
                                               How could they be improved?                              challenge matters such as                             different types of operations and, if so,
                                                  24. What is the extent to which it                    communications protocols, governance                  how? Should RTOs be expected to
                                               would be operationally and/or                            arrangements, and resumption and                      become more stringent over time as
                                               commercially feasible to comply with                     recovery practices. As stated in the                  technology advances?
                                               requirements to use certain defined data                 Sound Practices Paper, an RTO is the                     33. The Board requests comment on
                                               standards in order to increase the                       ‘‘amount of time in which a firm aims                 the benefits of requiring Board-
                                               substitutability of third-party                          to recover clearing and settlement                    supervised covered entities, at the
                                               relationships to reduce recovery times                   activities after a wide-scale disruption              holding company level, to measure the
                                               for systems impacted by a significant                    with the overall goal of completing                   residual cyber risk of their sector-critical
                                               cyber event?                                             material pending transactions on the                  systems on a quantitative basis. How
                                                  25. How do covered entities currently                 scheduled settlement date.’’ The scope                would this approach to measuring cyber
                                               evaluate their incident response and                     of application of this proposed sector-               risk compare with efforts already
                                               cyber resilience capabilities? What                      critical standard could go beyond the                 underway at holding companies to
                                               factors should the agencies consider                     core clearing and settlement                          manage and measure their cyber risk?
                                               essential in considering a covered                       organizations discussed in the Sound                  For example, what processes do holding
                                               entity’s incident response and cyber                     Practices Paper to include other large,               companies already have in place to
                                               response capabilities?                                   interconnected financial systems where                measure their residual cyber risk? What
                                                  26. How do covered entities currently                 a cyber-attack or disruption also could               challenges and costs would holding
                                               evaluate their situational awareness                     have a significant impact on the U.S.                 companies face in measuring their
                                                                                                        financial sector. With advances in                    residual cyber risk quantitatively? What
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                                                 19 Threat profiles include information about

                                               critical assets, threat actors, and details about how
                                                                                                        technology and consistent with the two-               are the benefits of requiring holding
                                               threat actors might attempt to compromise those          hour RTO for core clearing and                        companies to reduce the residual risk of
                                               critical assets.                                         settlement activities in the Sound                    their sector-critical systems to a
                                                 20 Threat modeling refers to using a structured
                                                                                                        Practices Paper, the agencies are                     minimal level, taking into account the
                                               process to identify how critical assets might be         considering establishing a two-hour                   risks associated with internal and
                                               compromised by a threat actor and why, what level
                                               of protection is needed for those critical assets, and   RTO for the sector-critical systems of                external dependencies connected to or
                                               what the impact would be if that protection failed.      covered entities.                                     supporting their sector-critical systems?


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                                               74326               Federal Register / Vol. 81, No. 207 / Wednesday, October 26, 2016 / Proposed Rules

                                               VII. Approach to Quantifying Cyber                      statement or guidance to imposing the                 adapt to changes in a firm’s operations
                                               Risk                                                    standards through a detailed regulation.              and to the evolving cyber environment.
                                                  The agencies are seeking to develop a                Under one approach, the agencies could                  In considering which option, or
                                               consistent, repeatable methodology to                   propose the standards as a combination                combination of options, to pursue to
                                               support the ongoing measurement of                      of a regulatory requirement to maintain               implement the standards, the agencies
                                                                                                       a risk management framework for cyber                 will consider whether the approach
                                               cyber risk within covered entities. Such
                                                                                                       risks along with a policy statement or                adopted ensures that the enhanced
                                               a methodology could be a valuable tool
                                                                                                       guidance that describes minimum                       standards are clear, the additional effort
                                               for covered entities and their regulators
                                                                                                       expectations for the framework, such as               required to implement the standards,
                                               to assess how well an entity is managing
                                                                                                       policies, procedures, and practices                   whether the standards are sufficiently
                                               its aggregate cyber risk and mitigating
                                                                                                       commensurate with the inherent cyber                  adaptable to address the changing cyber
                                               the residual cyber risk of its sector-
                                                                                                       risk level of the covered entity. This                environment, and the potential costs
                                               critical systems. At this time the
                                                                                                       approach would be similar to the                      and other burdens associated with
                                               agencies are not aware of any consistent
                                                                                                       approach that the agencies have taken in              implementing the standards.
                                               methodologies to measure cyber risk
                                                                                                       other areas of prudential supervision,
                                               across the financial sector using specific              such as the Interagency Guidelines                    Questions on Considerations for
                                               cyber risk management objectives. The                   Establishing Standards for Safety and                 Implementation of the Enhanced
                                               agencies are interested in receiving                    Soundness and the Interagency                         Standards
                                               comments on potential methodologies                     Guidelines Establishing Information                     37. What are the potential benefits or
                                               to quantify inherent and residual cyber                 Security Standards.21                                 drawbacks associated with each of the
                                               risk and compare entities across the                       Under a second approach, the                       options for implementing the standards
                                               financial sector.                                       agencies could propose regulations that               discussed above?
                                                  The agencies are familiar with                       impose specific cyber risk management                   38. What are the trade-offs, in terms
                                               different methodologies to measure                      standards. For example, the standards                 of the potential costs and other burdens,
                                               cyber risk for the financial sector.                    could require covered entities to                     among the three options discussed
                                               Among others, these include existing                    establish a cybersecurity framework                   above? The agencies invite commenters
                                               methodologies like the FAIR Institute’s                 commensurate with the covered entity’s                to submit data about the trade-offs
                                               Factor Analysis of Information Risk                     structure, risk profile, complexity,                  among the three options discussed
                                               standard and Carnegie Mellon’s Goal-                    activities, and size. Such standards                  above.
                                               Question-Indicator-Metric process.                      would address the five categories of                    39. Which approach has the potential
                                               Building upon these and other                           cyber risk management, discussed                      to most effectively implement the
                                               methodologies, the agencies are                         above, that the agencies consider key to              agencies’ expectations for enhanced
                                               considering how best to measure cyber                   a comprehensive cyber risk management                 cyber risk management?
                                               risk in a consistent, repeatable manner.                program: (1) Cyber risk governance; (2)
                                                                                                                                                               Dated: October 19, 2016.
                                               Questions on Approach to Quantifying                    cyber risk management; (3) internal
                                                                                                                                                             Thomas J. Curry,
                                               Cyber Risk Section                                      dependency management; (4) external
                                                                                                       dependency management; and (5)                        Comptroller of the Currency.
                                                  34. What current tools and practices,                incident response, cyber resilience, and                By order of the Board of Governors of the
                                               if any, do covered entities use to assess               situational awareness. Within each                    Federal Reserve System, October 19, 2016.
                                               the cyber risks that their activities,                  category, a covered entity would be                   Robert deV. Frierson,
                                               systems and operations pose to other                    expected to establish and maintain                    Secretary of the Board.
                                               entities within the financial sector, and               policies, procedures, practices, controls,              Dated at Washington, DC, this 19th day of
                                               to assess the cyber risks that other                    personnel and systems that address the                October, 2016.
                                               entities’ activities, systems and                       applicable category, and to establish and               By order of the Board of Directors.
                                               operations pose to them? How is such                    maintain a corporate governance                       Federal Deposit Insurance Corporation.
                                               risk currently identified, measured, and                structure that implements the cyber risk
                                               monitored?                                                                                                    Federal Deposit Insurance Corporation by
                                                                                                       management program on an enterprise-                  Robert E. Feldman,
                                                  35. What other models, frameworks,                   wide basis and along business line
                                               or reference materials should the                                                                             Executive Secretary.
                                                                                                       levels, monitors compliance with the
                                               agencies review in considering how best                 program, and adjusts corporate practices
                                                                                                                                                             [FR Doc. 2016–25871 Filed 10–25–16; 8:45 am]
                                               to measure and monitor cyber risk?                      to address the changes in risk presented              BILLING CODE 4810–33–P; 6210–01–P; 6714–01–P
                                                  36. What methodologies should the                    by the firm’s operations.
                                               agencies consider for the purpose of                       Under a third approach, the agencies
                                               measuring inherent and residual cyber                                                                         FEDERAL DEPOSIT INSURANCE
                                                                                                       could propose a regulatory framework
                                               risk quantitatively and qualitatively?                                                                        CORPORATION
                                                                                                       that is more detailed than the second
                                               What risk factors should agencies                       approach. As with the second approach,
                                               consider incorporating into the                                                                               12 CFR Parts 324, 329, and 382
                                                                                                       the regulation could contain standards
                                               measurement of inherent risk? How                       for the five categories of cyber risk
                                               should the risk factors be consistently                                                                       RIN 3064–AE46
                                                                                                       management. However, in contrast to
                                               measured and weighted?                                  the second approach, the regulation                   Restrictions on Qualified Financial
                                               VIII. Considerations for                                would include details on the specific                 Contracts of Certain FDIC-Supervised
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                                               Implementation of the Enhanced                          objectives and practices a firm would be              Institutions; Revisions to the Definition
                                               Standards                                               required to achieve in each area of                   of Qualifying Master Netting
                                                                                                       concern in order to demonstrate that its              Agreement and Related Definitions
                                                 The agencies are considering various                  cyber risk management program can
                                               regulatory approaches to establishing                                                                         AGENCY: Federal Deposit Insurance
                                               enhanced standards for covered entities.                  21 See12 CFR part 208, App. D–1, D–2; 12 CFR        Corporation (FDIC).
                                               The approaches range from establishing                  part 225, App. F (Board); 12 CFR part 364, App. A,    ACTION: Notice of proposed rulemaking.
                                               the standards through a policy                          B (FDIC); 12 CFR part 30, App. A, B, and D (OCC).



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Document Created: 2016-10-26 02:17:09
Document Modified: 2016-10-26 02:17:09
CategoryRegulatory Information
CollectionFederal Register
sudoc ClassAE 2.7:
GS 4.107:
AE 2.106:
PublisherOffice of the Federal Register, National Archives and Records Administration
SectionProposed Rules
ActionJoint advance notice of proposed rulemaking.
DatesComments must be received by January 17, 2017.
ContactBoard: Anna Lee Hewko, Associate Director, (202) 530-6260; or Matthew Hayduk, Manager, (202) 973-6190; or Julia Philipp, Senior Supervisory Financial Analyst, (202) 452-3940; or Christopher Olson, Senior Supervisory Financial Analyst, (202) 912-4609, Division of Banking Supervision and Regulation; or Benjamin W. McDonough, Special Counsel, (202) 452-2036; or Claudia Von Pervieux, Counsel, (202) 452- 2552; or Michelle Kidd, Counsel, (202) 736-5554, Legal Division; for persons who are deaf or hard of hearing, TTY (202) 263-4869.
FR Citation81 FR 74315 
RIN Number1557-AE06 and 3064-AE45
CFR Citation12
Title 12 CFR Chapter II
12 CFR 30
12 CFR 364

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