The Prudential Regulatory Authority (PRA) are placing greater demand on insurance services to manage cyber risk and ensure compliance with operational resilience regulations.
Intqual-pro, a global leading cyber security specialist, are urging insurance firms to raise cyber security awareness – a common oversight of resilience.
The threat presented by cyber attacks is nothing new. In 2014, Andrew Gracie, Executive Director, Resolution, Bank of England, highlighted the need for more effective cyber risk management at the British Bankers’ Association Cyber Conference.
“The capabilities of these actors, and thus the nature of the threat, are rapidly evolving – barriers to entry are low in cyber space and attacks are readily scalable. Low level attacks are now not isolated events but continuous. Unlike physical attacks that are localised, these attacks are international and know no boundaries.”
And in 2017, the risk of cyber was explored by Charlotte Gerken, Director, Supervisory Risk Specialists, at the Operational Risk Europe 2017 Conference.
“The cyber threat is particularly and peculiarly challenging and clearly of increasing concern to all of us. The chart from the Bank’s H2 2016 systemic risk survey shows 28% of firms citing cyber attacks amongst the most challenging risks they have to manage.”
With a clear indication of a need for increased cyber security skills and awareness, Intqual-pro are encouraging firms to sign up to their initiative, Cyber Stars.
The specialist training provider stated.
“It is common-place to have defences for physical attacks or environmental risks – such as a robbery or flood – but when it comes to cyber threats, we rely too heavily on system infrastructure. Whilst these systems have significant importance, the leading cause of successful cyber attacks (around 90%) is human error.
As humans we are vulnerable and this, unfortunately, plays to the advantage of a cyber criminal. These malicious actors can easily find valuable information about an organisation or individual online and manipulate it to create a sophisticated cyber attack, which many would not have a second thought about.
Now more than ever, it has never been more essential for us to be cyber aware.”
The Cyber Stars Initiative was developed by Intqual-pro in 2014 and has since seen organisations from all stretches of the globe sign up. Unlike other cyber security awareness programmes, Cyber Stars offers a sustainable solution in an ever-evolving threat landscape.
To learn more or to find out how to join the Cyber Stars Initiative, visit
www.intqual-pro.com/cyber-stars or contact cyber@intqual-pro.com.
