Insurer risk officers poised for more “severe” cyber impact in future

A majority of chief risk officers in the insurance industry expect cyber and information technology risks to become more severe in the coming months, according to Accenture’s recent Global Risk Management Study.

Of the insurance respondents, 74 percent feel cyber risks will become more pronounced and 61 percent feel strongly that such risks take up a great deal of CROs’ time. Another 61 percent said they have employed dedicated technology experts to help address cyber risk appropriately.

Accenture noted that 65 percent of respondents also feel that financial crime and fraud will pose a greater threat in the future and called upon the industry to investigate the intersections between these two risks.

“These dual threats should not be countered individually. As Accenture’s 2014 paper, Reorganizing for Today’s Cyber Threats, argued, there is now an urgent need to bring the historic silos of fraud risk management and IT security more closely together to combat mounting data security and cyber threats from increasingly well organized criminal entities,” stated the firm in its report. “Traditionally, CROs have concerned themselves primarily with the former, leaving the latter to chief information officers, but we feel this must now change.”

Accenture also observed growing concern within the insurance industry over finding skilled workers for many fields, but especially cyber. Understanding of cyber risks tied with data management skills for most in-demand field for the future.

“Recruiting and retaining adequate resources remains difficult,” said Grégory Erphelin at Crédit Agricole Assurances in the report. “Not only are we facing increased scarcity of relevant skills; we must also deal with greater specialization.”