Security News

The increase in frequency and cost of ransomware attacks has made ransomware a board-level risk and put the cyber insurance industry under extreme pressure. The proliferation of ransomware has led to an increase in the frequency and value of cyber insurance claims.

A phishing campaign used the guise of Instagram technical support to steal login credentials from employees of a prominent U.S. life insurance company headquartered in New York, researchers have revealed. According to a report published by Armorblox on Wednesday, the attack combined brand impersonation with social engineering and managed to bypass Google's email security by using a valid domain name, eventually reaching the mailboxes of hundreds of employees.

Aon, the British-American provider of insurance and pension administration, has brought in external specialists to help probe a "Cyber incident". In addition to broader risk insurance options, Aon sells cyber insurance policies and related solutions to customers, including Cyber Risk Financing, Cyber Impact Analysis, Security Testing, Incident Response Retainers, and Stroz Friedberg Digital Forensics.

Professional services and insurance giant AON has suffered a cyberattack that impacted a "Limited" number of systems. AON is a multinational professional services firm offering a wide array of solutions, including business insurance, reinsurance, cybersecurity consulting, risk solutions, healthcare insurance, and wealth management products.

Tarah Wheeler and Josephine Wolff analyze a recent court decision that the NotPetya attacks are not considered an act of war under the wording of Merck's insurance policy, and that the insurers must pay the $1B+ claim. Wheeler and Wolff argue that the judge "Did the right thing for the wrong reasons."

The US Federal Communications Commission today proposed the largest-ever fine against a robocaller for Telephone Consumer Protection Act violations. The Commission wants to hit Florida-based lead generator Interstate Brokers with a $45 million TCPA fine for making more than 500,000 unlawful robocalls without an emergency purpose or the consumers' prior express consent.

Insurers' use of predictive analytics to fight fraud has reached an all-time high, according to an insurance fraud technology study by the Coalition Against Insurance Fraud and SAS. The study reveals that 80% of insurers use predictive modeling to detect fraud, up from 55% in 2018. "The shifts we've seen since the 2018 study emphasize the increasingly sophisticated technologies needed to foil insurance fraudsters' criminal exploits," said David Hartley, Director of Insurance Solutions at SAS. "Predictive modeling is up 25%. Text mining has nearly doubled, jumping from 33% to 65% in three years. These findings prove that, even as COVID-19 has fueled rampant fraud, insurers are agilely stretching their advanced analytics capabilities to counter rapidly changing threats."

On 6th December 2021, the New Jersey Superior Court granted partial summary judgment in favour of Merck and International Indemnity, declaring that the War or Hostile Acts exclusion was inapplicable to the dispute. Merck suffered US$1.4 billion in business interruption losses from the Notpetya cyber attack of 2017 which were claimed against "All risks" property re/insurance policies providing coverage for losses resulting from destruction or corruption of computer data and software.

Bloomington School District 87 in Illinois has published its cyber-insurance renewal details, and the cost has jumped from $6,661 in 2021 to $22,229 this year. Suburban School Cooperative Insurance Program is an insurance pool allowing school districts to join together to negotiate better insurance rates and lower management fees.

Unsealed court records show pharmaceutical giant Merck was awarded a $1.4 billion payout last month on its property insurance policy, for losses the company suffered because of the 2017 NotPetya cyberattacks. Merck's $1.75 billion property insurance policy will have to cover the damage the NotPetya attacks did to the company's 40,000 computers, totaling more than $1.4 billion, according to the court filing.