Page 15 - 2016 State of the Market from AmWINS
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FEATURED TREND: CYBER LIABILITY
As buyer demand grows, specialization in cyber is essential
Last year, hacking incidents reached a example, lawyers have a professional headlines where the insured sued their
nine-year high.5 Healthcare remains the obligation to maintain confidentiality brokers because they were sold a policy
most threatened sector, with nearly 90 of personal information. Is a “breach” that didn’t provide the coverage they
percent of organizations experiencing considered a professional liability error or expected,” says Roddy Graham, managing
breaches in the last two years, followed by a privacy breach? Similarly, technology director of the financial lines division of
retail, government, education, and financial consultants may perform work that THB Group in London.
services.6 inadvertently triggers the release of
confidential information. Is this considered Brokers also need to take care to
A constant stream of headlines around a professional error or a security liability coordinate cyber coverage with other
cyber breaches continues to turn cyber- issue? forms, such as crime. “We have seen
browsers into buyers across these several disputed claims involving social
sectors. With more than 70 carriers “In these instances, it may make more engineering, and we are placing separate
currently offering coverage, the trend in sense to combine the two lines of crime policies to ensure those types of
purchasing has been toward standalone coverage to avoid coverage gaps or claims are fully covered,” Graham says.
coverage forms. discrepancies between different insurance
policies, as long as you aren’t limiting Interest in cyber coverage will continue to
“Carriers continue to try to add cyber to the scope of coverage available from grow, even among small business owners
forms in the E&O and D&O space, but the either type of standalone coverage,” says who until recently didn’t view themselves
challenge is that there is so much capacity David Lewison, senior vice president and as targets for cyber criminals.
for standalone cyber it’s often better for national professional lines practice leader
the insured to seek a more robust policy,” at AmWINS Group, Inc. Forty-eight states have privacy and data
says Andrew Pritchard, executive vice breach laws, in addition to the numerous
president and professional lines broker at Since there are no industry standards federal laws. Cyber threats are constantly
AmWINS Brokerage in Bernardsville, New for cyber forms, the rule is buyer – or evolving and, along with providing brokers
Jersey. broker – beware. “The line is becoming access to a robust E&S market, AmWINS
slightly more standardized, but there are has been developing proprietary products
There are certain industries where still significant differences in the space. for this increasingly important line of
the cyber risk and E&O risk blur. For Over the last year, we have seen several business.
5, 6 Identity Theft Resource Center
