Mitigating risk exposure to cyber threats is a growing concern for today’s businesses. Key on this list is smaller but growing companies that see more risks simply because they have increasing numbers of transactions or customers. It’s one of the reasons many companies are increasing their investment in cyber insurance.
According to the “Benchmarking Trends: Cyber Attacks Drive Insurance Purchases for New and Existing Buyers” report from Marsh, the amount of spending on cyber insurance policies by companies has grown 2% in the first six months for 2016. What’s important is to realize that nearly every business in most industries are facing the need to increase spending in this area. The report indicates a few specific industries where this significant spending is occurring, including:
- Power and utility companies that have seen as much as 100% growth in cyber insurance spending.
- Schools, including universities, where investing is up 155%.
- Healthcare organizations, including doctors, increased by 41%.
- Hospitality and gaming industries added more cyber protection at a rate of 5 to 8%.
- Financial institutions already have a high level of protection because of their high-risk status for these types of attacks.
Cyber attacks involve the theft of personal information such as Social Security numbers, but also credit card information, transaction data, personal addresses and phone numbers, and much more.
What Can Companies Do To Protect Their Business?
It is important for all companies, including small upstarts to large corporations to invest time into improving security of specific at-risk information. Security methods are becoming more important every time a credit card is swiped or a form filled out. However, having this type of security in place is only partly effective. It’s also essential for companies to mitigate risk through insurance products.
Cyber insurance is available to provide a layer of liability protection from threats. It’s important for smaller and growing organizations to realize that, if large organizations have been hacked even with advanced security systems in place and millions of dollars spent on security, their small organization is also at risk. While prevention is always the mainstay of the process, insurance protection becomes just as important.
Identify Potential Risks and Secure Against Them
With the upcoming holiday season impacting many small businesses, it’s more important than ever for companies to take steps right now to shore up security risks. The increased number of customers and transactions may lead to more threats. Thieves also become more active during this timeframe.
With our help, it’s possible to mitigate much of this cyber threat exposure. With business growth relying more on cyber activity than ever, it’s necessary for companies to become vigilant. Our team can help assess risks to this threat within any company and offer comprehensive insurance products to help keep your company protected should such a risk occur. Effective cyber liability insurance is no longer an option for most companies, but rather a vital component to mitigating risk and reducing the threat of expensive lawsuits when thieves break in to sensitive data.