Emergence Insurance has expanded to Western Australia by opening a new office in Perth which will be headed by new business development underwriter James Lee. The insurer is said to be a pioneer of cyber cover in Australia and provides protection for SMEs through to ASX-listed entities.
Businesses in China, Japan and India are seeing an estimated average loss of nearly 10% of their revenue due to cyber attacks, revealed a new report from global research initiative titled 'The Cybersecurity Imperative'. In fact, annual losses from cyber attacks globally averaged $4.7m in the last fiscal year with over one in 10 firms losing over $10m. This highlights that most companies across industries and regions are witnessing a greater volume of cyber attacks and higher losses per incident.
Cybersecurity professionals anticipate that cyber-criminals will be working overtime during this summer, taking advantage of the fact that many employees are taking vacations and/or are working remotely.
The first quarter of 2019 saw a 17% increase in cyber criminals using impersonation in phishing attacks primarily by imitating well-known brands, revealed new research from cyber security company FireEye which analysed 1.3bn phishing emails. This has stressed the need for organisations to engage in better training and education as well as insurance as a last line of defence.
Moody's Corporation and Team8, a leading cyber security think tank and company creation platform, have announced the formation of a joint venture to establish a global standard for evaluating and assessing cyber risk for enterprises.
The Australian National Audit Office (ANAO) has called out Australia Post - the country's government-owned postal service - as not being 'cyber resilient'. In a report by the auditor general titled Cyber Resilience of Government Business Enterprise and Corporate Commonwealth Entities, the Post was noted to have weaknesses in its implementation of its risk management framework.
Markel International has introduced its new Cyber 360 policy which provides protection against cyber risks on a standalone and add-on basis for businesses in Asia, Europe and Canada. The policy covers up to GBP10m ($12.6m)/GBP15m/GBP20m per risk and it is expected that the coverage will help both small and large businesses safeguard their business before, during and after a cyber attack.
The top cyber threats come from cyber-crime groups and hackers and the third-greatest threat is from non-malicious internal employees.
Email, even after 20 years of its advent, is still the most vulnerable to cyber criminals. Email frauds continue to be the most effective for cyber criminals. Phishing attacks went up by 17% in the first quarter of this year over the previous year.
Vietnam's professional competency framework (PCF) for the general insurance industry was officially launched in Hanoi on 24 June and will provide insurers with a measuring tool for their own internal training as well as professional development for employees.