In the world of business insurance, there are few risks the coronavirus pandemic has magnified more than cyberrisk. There is nothing like a pandemic to bring out the bad actors who want to strike when companies have their guards down.
With more people working from home, increased internet traffic, and more reliance on technology for what were face-to-face meetings and transactions, increased vigilance against cybercrime is more important than ever.
Criminals and hackers are moving away from high-volume, low-value attacks. Instead, they are targeting senior managers and others who have access to company bank accounts and can authorize payments. These attacks are on the uptick.
Now is the time to review your cybersecurity processes. An attack can have a big effect on your employees, customers and reputation, and can result in a serious financial loss. You don’t want to be the guy who clicked on the malware link that slipped through an out-of-date spam filter.
Cyberliability insurance can provide risk management services before, during and after a data breach. There are two important types of cyberliability — first party and third party.
A first party cyberliability occurs when your own data is stolen. This can include your employees’ personal information or information about your customers. A cyberliability policy provides credit monitoring services to assist the affected individuals which could help minimize the risk of identity theft. Included in the category of first party cyberliability are:
• Funds transfer fraud.
• Lost business income due to cybertheft (a hack or data breach).
Third party liability coverage can provide protection for damage caused by your business to third parties due to a hack. This could be confidential client information that you store in your system. Coverage included in this category are:
• Breach of privacy.
• Misuse of personal data.
• Transmission of malicious content.
Everyone should operate under the assumption that it’s only a matter of time before a system hack occurs. The security steps you take now can push that time into the future. And cyber coverage on your insurance policy can be a helpful aid in your recovery.
