A new report concludes that companies of all sizes are advisedto consider cyber threats as one of the fastest growing risks, withinformation technology (IT) assets often as valuable as theirproperty assets. 

The 2015 Global Cyber Impact Report, independentlyconducted by the Ponemon Institute and sponsored by Aon,identifies the financial impact of cyber incidents compared totangible asset vulnerabilities. The global study, which surveyedmore than 2,200 companies in 40 countries, found that while cyberis one of the fastest growing risks for companies, businesses areonly protecting 12% of those assets compared to 51% of tangibleproperty assets, leaving IT assets 39% more exposed than propertyassets.

Additional key findings:

• Information assets are underinsured against theft ordestruction based on the value, Probable Maximum Loss (PML) andlikelihood of an incident occurring, even though PML can exceed$200 million.
• 52% of respondents believe their companies' exposure to cyberrisk will increase over the next 2 years, but only 19% ofrespondents say their company has cyber insurance coverage with anaverage limit of $13 million.
• Exposure to cyber risk is expected to increase, but 54% ofrespondents say there is no plan to purchase cyber insurance.
• 37% of companies surveyed experienced a material orsignificantly disruptive security exploit or data breach one ormore times in the past 2 years and the average economic impact ofthe event was $2.1 million.
• Awareness of the economic and legal consequences from aninternational data breach or security exploit is low.
• While system or business process failures where the most oftencited as the cause of a data breach or exploit, only 33% ofrespondents say these incidents are covered by their cyberinsurance.
• 5 years from now the projected growth in the use ofInternet-connected devices will grow from 10 to 50 billion.

 What are the main reasons companies gave fornot purchasing cyber security insurance?

• 31% – coverage is inadequate based on the exposure
• 29% – premiums are too expensive
• 26% – property and casualty policies are sufficient
• 26% – there are too many exclusions, restriction anduninsurable risks

 Download the full report byvisiting, Aon Report: 2015 Global Cyber Impact.