Business Email Compromise Overtakes Ransomware And Data Breaches In Cyber-Insurance Claims

Business email compromise (BEC) has overtaken ransomware and data breaches as the main reason companies filed a cyber-insurance claim in the EMEA (Europe, the Middle East, and Asia) region last year, said insurance giant AIG.

According to statistics published in July, AIG said that BEC-related insurance filings accounted for nearly a quarter (23%) of all cyber-insurance claims the company received in 2018.

Ransomware-related incidents came in in second place, accounting for 18% of all cyber-insurance claims in the EMEA region, followed by claims for data breaches caused by hackers and data breaches caused by employee negligence (e.g. sending data to the wrong person), both with 14%.

All in all, AIG said that cyber-insurance claims nearly doubled between 2017 and 2018 and that they received more cyber-insurance claims last year than in 2016 and 2017 combined.