Companies turn to insurance as data-loss safety net

 

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By Stewart Mitchell

Posted on 15 Sep 2010 at 13:22

Organisations are increasingly looking at insurance to augment their security systems, according to research from PriceWaterhouseCooper.

In its annual Global State of Information Security Survey, PwC said that nearly four out of ten UK companies were taking out insurance policies to protect against damage caused by data loss.

“We're seeing more and more people looking to insurance – there have been so many high-profile legal problems that people are turning to insurance as an option,” William Beer, the director of PwC's OneSecurity practice, told PC Pro.

“They still have to show the insurance companies that they have security in place – such as the ISO 27001 standard – but many more companies are looking into insurance.”

According to Beer, of the UK companies that had insurance protecting against "theft or misuse of assets such as electronic data or customer records", an enormous 83% had successfully made a claim on the policy, compared with only 13% globally.

PwC also reported that UK companies were not planning on increasing their security spending as quickly as those in other countries. In the UK, less than a third of companies intend to spend more on security over the coming year, compared with 52% globally.

"It was surprising to see the UK data, because the level of optimism on spending here is far lower than globally, although that is somewhat skewed by spending in Asia,” said Beer. "Such spending restraints may risk the ability of organisations to protect their most sensitive data."

The survey sampled more than 13,000 executives and information security professionals around the world, with 640 polled in the UK.