FRANKFURT: ECB AI cybersecurity plans must be submitted by 110 major European banks by October 31, the European Central Bank told lenders on Tuesday.
The ECB Supervisory Board issued the request in a letter citing rising cybersecurity risks posed by increasingly powerful artificial intelligence systems.
Claudia Buch, head of the ECB Supervisory Board, wrote that new AI models marked a long-term shift in the threat landscape rather than a temporary phenomenon.
Buch said the developments did not create entirely new risks, but increased the speed and scale at which existing risks could materialise.
The ECB asked major institutions, including Deutsche Bank, BNP Paribas and Santander, to outline immediate and longer-term measures to strengthen cyber resilience.
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The supervisory board said banks’ management bodies carry primary responsibility for responding to the changing cyber-risk environment.
The European policymakers had grown concerned about AI models such as Anthropic’s Mythos, which can help identify weaknesses in computer systems.
A European systemic-risk body also warned that malicious actors were already using advanced AI models to enhance cyberattacks.
Anthropic initially withheld the full Mythos models from public release due to hacking concerns, then released a public version with built-in safety filters last month.