Are you taking a gamble on your business? Why Cyber Insurance is a must have

In a week featuring the race that stops a nation gambling comes front of mind for a lot of people.

Whilst you may have had a flutter and won this week, the one thing we are sure you never want to gamble on is your business’ ability to recover from a cyber-attack.

Some of you familiar with our 14 ways to protect your business from a cyber attack you will remember that our bonus tip was taking up Cyber Insurance.

One such company offering Cyber Insurance to businesses in Australia is world renowned security firm Chubb.

Chubb recently released some stats from their cyber claims over the past 10 years, which make for some interesting (and scary) reading

Cyber incidents originating from social engineering such as phishing and vhising (voice phishing) topped the list increasing at a rate of 1500% from 2009 to 2019 (peaking at an 1800% increase by 2018).

When considering the costs of responding to a cyber incident, businesses typically focus on their potential liability and third-party costs, such as the loss of third-party data and the potential risk of lawsuits relating to the cyber incident, which of course are extremely important but there are many more areas where the cost of a cyber attack can cripple a business.

Among various other categories, business interruption losses, payments made in connection with ransomware, and PCI assessments also contribute to overall costs associated with cyber claims.

But just as important - and often underestimated - are the incident response costs, which are the costs organisations incur to retake control after an incident. This includes the costs to hire a forensics team to stop the incident and attempt to recover lost data, legal teams to evaluate regulatory and legal risk – the Notifiable Data Breach Scheme being a big one in Australia, public relations firms to manage the messaging that follows an event, and much more.  FortiTech has had first-hand experience in helping a business recover from an attack and we can tell you, it is not a fun experience.

Chubb reported that the average amount they paid out for forensics related activities of a cyber-attack since 2009 was a staggering USD173,193 or around AUD270,000, imagine your business needing to come up with that much money in a hurry, whilst also having no access to your systems. 

If you are interested in finding out more about Chubb’s Cyber Insurance offering give us a call on 1300 778 078.