The Financial Services Sector Coordinating Council for Critical Infrastructure Protection and Homeland Security (FSSCC) announced today the U.S. financial services industry has begun preparations to test its ability to respond to a pandemic with an exercise to take place in the fall.
The multi-week, sector-wide pandemic exercise is sponsored by the U.S. Treasury Department, in partnership with FSSCC, the Financial and Banking Information Infrastructure Committee (FBIIC), and with the Securities Industry and Financial Management Association (SIFMA) playing a key planning and project management role, this will be the first exercise of this scope in the U.S.
The exercise is scheduled to begin on September 24, 2007, with the multi-week duration allowing sufficient time to simulate a full pandemic wave. Participants will take part in the exercise from their own locations using email and a secure exercise web site.
Key goals of the exercise include identifying systemic risk to the sector as a whole, provide participants an opportunity to test their individual plans against a realistic scenario and to clarify the ripple effects of a pandemic within the markets and interdependent sectors.
All sub-sectors of financial services are represented in the planning process, and broad participation from throughout the sector is anticipated. The exercise will also involve advisory group representatives from key sectors on which the financial industry depends, such as power and telecommunications, as well as critical agencies such as the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC). The exercise will be comparable to the pandemic exercise conducted in the fall of 2006 in the U.K.
"This unprecedented exercise will help prepare the financial services industry to respond in the best possible way to a pandemic event," said George S. Hender, Chairman of FSSCC. "Ensuring the financial sector can meet the challenge of all types of disruptions with minimal impact is critical to our nation."
About FSSCC:
The Financial Services Sector Coordinating Council for Critical Infrastructure Protection and Homeland Security (www.fsscc.org) is a group of more than 30 private-sector firms and financial trade associations that works to help reinforce the financial services sector's resilience against terrorist attacks and other threats to the nation's financial infrastructure. Formed in 2002, FSSCC works with the Department of Treasury, which has direct responsibility for infrastructure protection and homeland security efforts for the financial services sector, while also serving under the overall guidance of the Department for Homeland Security.
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