ECB summons banks over AI-driven cyber risks, warns of fast-evolving vulnerabilities – Firstpost

The European Central Bank (ECB) has called major lenders to a hastily arranged meeting this week, warning that rapid advances in artificial intelligence are significantly amplifying cyber security risks across the financial system, the Financial Times reported.

The urgent supervisory intervention underscores growing concern among regulators that next-generation AI models are exposing critical weaknesses in banks’ IT infrastructure, sharply compressing the time available to detect and fix vulnerabilities before they can be exploited.

ECB supervisors are expected to tell lenders that the cyber threat landscape is evolving far faster than existing defence systems, and that banks must materially accelerate response and remediation cycles, according to the FT report.

At the centre of regulatory concern are advanced AI systems such as Anthropic’s Claude Mythos Preview, which have reportedly demonstrated the ability to identify thousands of high-severity vulnerabilities across operating systems, browsers and enterprise software.

Anthropic has said its model has uncovered widespread flaws in digital infrastructure, raising fears that similar tools could be weaponised by malicious actors if broadly deployed.

ECB officials are expected to warn that once software patches are released, AI systems may be able to reverse-engineer underlying vulnerabilities within minutes—dramatically narrowing the remediation window for financial institutions and technology providers.

‘Clock is ticking,’ ECB tells lenders

ECB supervisory board vice-chair Frank Elderson has reportedly stressed the urgency of the issue, urging banks to move beyond incremental upgrades toward rapid, system-wide cyber resilience.

Speaking to the FT, Elderson likened the shift required to a change in tempo, saying that while “andante” may have sufficed earlier, the current environment demands “presto” speed.

He is expected to reiterate at Tuesday’s meeting that banks cannot rely on uneven access to frontier AI systems as justification for slower action, noting that cyber adversaries are likely to acquire comparable capabilities.

Rising compliance and systemic risk concerns

Regulators have also flagged concerns over unequal access to advanced AI tools, with Anthropic reportedly limiting Claude Mythos Preview to a small group of organisations, largely in the United States.

This has left several European banks without direct exposure to systems being used to map vulnerabilities, prompting calls for greater information sharing among global lenders.

The ECB oversees around 111 major banks across the euro area. It is now pushing institutions to upgrade automated patching, real-time threat detection and AI-assisted security systems.

Elderson reportedly warned that attackers using AI could reconstruct flaws almost instantly after patches are released, making delayed responses a critical risk.