Glossary term
VAIT
Also: German Insurance Supervisory Requirements for IT
BaFin circular for insurance undertakings. Counterpart to BAIT in banking, derived from MaGo. Regulates IT strategy, information security, user permissions, IT projects and outsourcing.
VAIT applies to primary and reinsurance undertakings under VAG supervision. Current version from 2018 with updates. Closely modelled on BAIT with insurance-specific accents (customer and policy systems, Riester/Rürup data flow).
Core chapters: IT strategy, IT governance, information risk / security / user permission management, IT projects and application development, IT operations, outsourcing.
In practice
With DORA application from January 2025, VAIT is partially overlaid. Insurers must operate in a transition phase 2025-2027 that combines DORA duties with VAIT details.
Related terms
BAIT
BaFin circular that concretises IT requirements for credit institutions. Specifies MaRisk AT 7.2 for IT strategy, information security, user permissions, project management, application development, and IT outsourcing.
DORA
EU regulation on digital operational resilience in the financial sector. Directly applicable since 17 January 2025. Five pillars: ICT risk management, incident management, resilience testing including TLPT, third-party governance, information sharing.
Vendor matrix
A structured comparison of vendor options across weighted criteria, showing scores, evidence per cell and an aggregate result. A good vendor matrix separates dealbreakers from weighted criteria and makes every score traceable to a source.
AI Act Conformity Assessment
Procedure to demonstrate that a high-risk AI system complies with the EU AI Act before being placed on the market or put into service. Mandatory for all Annex III high-risk systems from 2 December 2027 (postponed from the original 2 August 2026 by the Digital Omnibus, Regulation (EU) 2026/1744).
AI Act Risk Categories
Four-tier classification under the EU AI Act: prohibited (Art. 5), high-risk (Annex I/III), limited risk (Art. 50 transparency), minimal risk. Classification is the first duty; it must be documented and defensible.
Audit-ready decision
A decision whose record is structured, evidence-backed and stakeholder-signed to a level that a third-party auditor, a supervisor or a board reviewer can reconstruct the reasoning without interviewing the original team.
BCM
Discipline for maintaining critical business processes during disruptions. Standards: ISO 22301, BSI Standard 200-4. Mandatory under BAIT/VAIT and DORA Art. 11 in the financial sector.
BSI C5
Cloud audit catalogue of the German BSI that defines minimum security baseline and transparency duties. Evidenced via an ISAE 3000 C5 attestation. De facto standard for cloud procurement in the German market.