Gerry Cross, Chair of the Joint European Supervisory Authorities (ESAs) Sub-Committee on Digital Operational Resilience, has given an overview of the state of DORA compliance. Mr Cross, who is also Director of Financial Regulation, Policy and Risk at the Central Bank of Ireland made his comments during a speech at the recent 6-Months to DORA event organised by the Institute of International Finance and Amazon Web Services.
In the speech Mr Cross set out the current state of development of the DORA regulation confirming that although the ‘co-legislators set a tight deadline for the coming into effect of the new framework – the 17th January 2025’ strong momentum has been maintained and ‘we remain pretty much on track to deliver the new regulatory framework on time and to schedule’.
Mr Cross addressed concerns about the tight deadline, stating that: “One of the messages that we heard during the course of the recent consultation was that the time period between the finalising of the regulatory requirements and their coming into effect is extremely short. Respondents are concerned that the time available for them to implement the finalised rules is too short.”
In response Mr Cross said that, while the ESAs recognise that this is a valid concern, the DORA regulations ‘represent the legal reality as mandated by the co-legislative authorities’ and ‘it is outside the power of any ESA or competent authority to alter this fact’. He also pointed out that DORA ‘represents in many respects what any well managed firm should be doing’.
“So while it may be recognised that there are aspects that are only becoming finally clear now. At the same time firms can be expected to have already been laying much of the groundwork for implementation over the recent years,” said Mr Cross.
