Take-Aways (AI)
  • The Fede­ral Coun­cil reco­gnizes a signi­fi­cant gap in the cyber resi­li­ence regu­la­ti­on of digi­tal pro­ducts in Switz­er­land com­pared to the EU Cyber Resi­li­ence Act.
  • The BACS, OFCOM and SECO are to draw up a con­sul­ta­ti­on draft for legis­la­ti­on on cyber resi­li­ence by fall 2026.
  • New rules are to regu­la­te safe­ty requi­re­ments, mar­ket sur­veil­lan­ce and bans on unsafe imports, with adap­t­ati­on to Switz­er­land as a busi­ness location.

The Fede­ral Coun­cil notes that in Switz­er­land Spe­ci­fi­ca­ti­ons for the cyber resi­li­ence of digi­tal pro­ducts are lar­ge­ly absent – unli­ke in the EU with the Cyber Resi­li­ence Act (CRA; see Here is our edi­ted ver­si­on), and although

Secu­ri­ty vul­nerabi­li­ties in soft­ware or hard­ware […] are a gate­way for cyber attacks. If attackers find such a gap, they can pene­tra­te num­e­rous systems in a short space of time. As many indi­vi­du­al pro­ducts are often digi­tal­ly net­work­ed, this can result in major phy­si­cal or eco­no­mic dama­ge. In the case of pro­ducts that are used in cri­ti­cal infras­truc­tures, vul­nerabi­li­ties can jeo­par­di­ze natio­nal secu­ri­ty. Alt­hough it is cru­cial for cyber­se­cu­ri­ty to avo­id secu­ri­ty vul­nerabi­li­ties or to clo­se them quick­ly, the­re are hard­ly any requi­re­ments for the cyber resi­li­ence of digi­tal pro­ducts in Switzerland.

The Fede­ral Coun­cil wants to chan­ge this. On August 20, 2025, it com­mis­sio­ned the Fede­ral Office for Cyber­se­cu­ri­ty (BACS), in col­la­bo­ra­ti­on with the Fede­ral Office of Com­mu­ni­ca­ti­ons (OFCOM) and the Sta­te Secre­ta­ri­at for Eco­no­mic Affairs (SECO), to deve­lop a cyber­se­cu­ri­ty stra­tegy by Fall 2026Con­sul­ta­ti­on draft on the “Crea­ti­on of legis­la­ti­on on the cyber resi­li­ence of digi­tal pro­ducts” to deve­lop (Media release):

The new legal basis is inten­ded to defi­ne the cyber­se­cu­ri­ty regu­la­ti­ons for the deve­lo­p­ment and mar­ke­ting of pro­ducts with digi­tal ele­ments, defi­ne the imple­men­ta­ti­on of mar­ket sur­veil­lan­ce for the­se pro­ducts and crea­te the basis for a ban on the import and dis­tri­bu­ti­on of unsafe devices.

and:

The new legal basis is inten­ded to increa­se the safe­ty requi­re­ments for pro­ducts with digi­tal ele­ments and thus meet the requi­re­ments of the Moti­on “Imple­men­ta­ti­on of urgen­tly nee­ded cyber­se­cu­ri­ty audits” 24.3810 of the Secu­ri­ty Poli­cy Com­mit­tee of the Coun­cil of States.

The CRA should be “respec­ted”, but the legis­la­ti­on should be “adapt­ed to Switz­er­land as a busi­ness loca­ti­on” and it should be ensu­red “that the admi­ni­stra­ti­ve bur­den on com­pa­nies is kept as low as pos­si­ble and that inter­na­tio­nal­ly acti­ve com­pa­nies from Switz­er­land are not addi­tio­nal­ly bur­den­ed by diver­gent requirements”.