With the continuous flurry of cyber activity globally – and at Advisen – I thought I’d sit down with Advisen’s resident cyber expert Aloysius Tan to get his take on what we’re currently seeing in the market and how Advisen is responding.
Aloysius Tan, Product Manager
Q: How long have you worked at Advisen and what is your role?
A: I have been on the products team at Advisen since 2013. Besides leading the development of Cyber OverVue, I am also focused on developing other data-driven analytics solutions that help drive more effective decision-making.
Q: You are hailed as Advisen’s go-to person for cyber. What do you think is the most interesting aspect of working with the insurance industry to better understand cyber risk?
A: The people for sure! Cyber is such a dynamic field that it attracts a whole host of equally dynamic individuals that are all trying to solve this problem in tandem. This in turn breeds a sense of community where a lot of sharing/laughter goes on. There’s never a dull moment!
Q: Where can we find you if you’re not busy speaking with the insurance industry about cyber?
A: Eating my way across a city near you, probably.
Q: What are some of the cyber trends you are seeing right now?
A: Just last week, we had a panel of experts discuss cyber risk trends from 2017. We’ve seen a large increase in the number of ransomware events over the past 2 years. The increase in ransomware attacks is largely driven by the ease in which criminals can make a “quick buck” and the availability of off the shelf ransomware kits online. The industry is responding to an increase in claims and questions regarding what to do next or how to handle an attack. Those companies with older policies may find that the cyber threats they are faced with today may not be covered.
Q: You’ve been working on some pretty exciting things over the past year. What can you share with us?
A: We’ve been working on increasing not just the volume but quality of our cyber data over the past year. This has really helped lay the foundation that culminated in Cyber OverVue, our analytics solution that leverages Advisen’s proprietary data to generate a loss profile and benchmark analysis in one application.
Q: Can you tell us a little more about Cyber OverVue?
A: It is a web-based, SaaS application that helps enable more efficient real-time decision-making based on the quantification of known losses. Cyber OverVue generates on-demand scores and analyses that provide users with detailed insights into an organization’s cyber loss profile, which can be used as a basis for assessing its potential risks going forward.
Q: You mentioned that Cyber OverVue provides scores based on known losses. Is this the same as what other companies in the market are offering?
A: Cyber OverVue provides a view of risk based on historical events – or known losses – it is not predictive. It can be used independently or in conjunction with existing predictive tools to provide another view of cyber risk.
Q: What prompted you to develop a cyber analytics solution? It sounds like a departure from the data you’ve traditionally provided to the insurance industry.
A: The development of Cyber OverVue was a collaborative process with industry leaders to address a market-driven need for an analytics product based on the quantification of known losses. It not only enables more informed underwriting decisions, but also justification of coverage recommendations based on the historical loss experience of an organization. With this innovation, clients are armed with the facts related to cyber loss experience and transparent metrics, allowing them to make more informed decisions. This is the future of Advisen and the commercial P&C insurance industry. We’re really excited about the release and the positive response we’ve gotten!
Q: What’s the next big thing you are working on?
A: Besides enhancements to Cyber OverVue, we’re working on expanding OverVue to other lines of business. We’re also looking at overhauling our existing products to provide additional value while making them more user-friendly.
Q: Will we see you at any upcoming conferences?
A: We are having a series of roadshows to launch Cyber OverVue at our upcoming conferences, so I will be San Francisco, London and Chicago in the coming months. I will also be moderating a panel at our cyber conference in San Francisco on data breaches, as well as speaking about underwriting tools at our cyber conference in London in March. Oh and RIMS in April too! Stop and say hi if our paths happen to cross!
