Lloyds joins new British banking cyber defence alliance - sources

LONDON (Reuters) - Lloyds Banking Group is the latest bank to join a new British cyber security group for banks called the Cyber Defence Alliance (CDA), sources with direct knowledge of the matter told Reuters.

Lloyds joins Barclays, Deutsche Bank, Santander UK and Standard Chartered in the CDA, the sources said.

A spokeswoman for Lloyds confirmed that the bank joined the group on December 8.

The list of other banks participating is confirmed by company filings reviewed by Reuters.

The London-based CDA was created to facilitate sharing of information following cyber security incidents, with banks joining it paying to help to fund it and gain access to the group's pooled knowledge on the latest attack methods, the sources said.

Banks have stepped up information sharing on such security incidents in recent months in response to an increase in attacks on their systems, including an attack on Tesco Bank last November that was Britain's biggest ever financial cyber heist.

Lloyds said on Jan. 23 it was working with law enforcement agencies to trace who might be behind a cyber attack that caused intermittent outages for customers of its personal banking websites.

(Reporting By Lawrence White. Editing by Jane Merriman)