BOSTON (Reuters) – U.S. retailers are planning to form anindustry group for collecting and sharing intelligence about cybersecurity threats in a bid to prevent future attacks in the wake oflast year's big attack on Target Corp.

The National Retail Federation said on Monday it will establishan Information Sharing and Analysis Center, or ISAC, for the retailindustry in June.

ISACs are industry groups that typically run security operationscenters that operate around the clock, providing alerts aboutemerging threats to their members and sharing information providedby law enforcement and other government agencies.

They are set up under terms of a 1998 U.S. presidentialdirective to foster sharing of security information between thepublic and private sector.

There are more than a dozen such organizations among industriesincluding financial services, emergency services, healthcare,technology companies, public transportation and utilities.

The financial services industry ISAC, which is widely consideredthe most successful group of its type, will help retailers set upthe new organization.

Retailers have been under pressure from Congress and consumersto bolster security since the attack on Target, which resulted inthe theft of some 40 million payment card numbers and another 70million customer records, which were uncovered late last year.

After the breach was uncovered, retailers privately complainedthat they had difficulty obtaining information from law enforcementabout what had happened and how to thwart follow-on attacks.

In January, the Department of Homeland Security produced areport titled "Indicators for Network Defenders" that containedinformation about its secret investigation into the Target breach.It was released through the Financial Services ISAC and otherroutes, but some retailers had trouble obtaining it because theindustry lacked an established group for sharing information oncyber threats.

The new ISAC will also allow retailers to share tips on fightinghackers, which the industry hopes might prevent future attacks andmake consumer data more secure.

"It will allow them to talk to each other about things arehitting them, to know quickly if other people are experiencing thesame things and if they've found good defenses that they can telleach other about," said Alan Paller, founder of SANS Institute, anon-profit group that trains security professionals.