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WTW: CrowdStrike Global Outage

The CrowdStrike technology outage underscores the fragility of global IT systems. WTW highlights the importance of managing cyber related vulnerabilities and maintaining apt risk management strategies when dealing with third parties in any organisation, advising on the next steps for NEDs moving forward.  

Organisations across a wide range of industries around the world have been grappling with the impacts of a global technology outage attributed to CrowdStrike, a cybersecurity firm whose software is used to protect against hackers and outside breaches. Microsoft estimates that 8.5 million Windows devices have been impacted by the outage.

When viewed through the prism of cyber insurance, this incident will likely be considered a system failure (commonly defined in many cyber policies as an unintentional and unplanned failure of a computer system or network). In the latest client alert from WTW, the firm unpacks the insurance implications of the outage, providing a comprehensive outline of cyber insurance policies, and the key points to consider when evaluating coverage for business interruption loss and extra expense.

While the initial issue has been identified and isolated, and a fix has been deployed, the ongoing disruption from this incident will continue over the coming weeks. In the immediate aftermath, cyber criminals will seek to exploit the situation using phishing emails purporting to be from CrowdStrike or Microsoft. It’s important that organisations and their staff continue to remain vigilant for any suspicious communications.

From a broader perspective, identifying, understanding and managing cyber/network related vulnerabilities should be part of the operational resilience strategy of every organisation.

What the CrowdStrike issue reinforces is that while an organisation can develop an effective cyber security strategy, the dependency on third parties is not a risk that is easy to manage. How would your organisation respond in the immediate aftermath? Crucially, what can you do today to boost your resilience and better safeguard the business from cyber incidents?

Preparing in advance is one of the best ways to reduce the cost of dealing with a major cyber/network incident similar to the CrowdStrike incident. All insurers now are insisting businesses meet specific cyber security criteria to be eligible to purchase cyber insurance.

Learn More

To read more about the short-term fixes and long-term considerations following the CrowdStrike incident, and to download the full WTW client alert, follow the link here.

About WTW

WTW is a multinational insurance company providing data-driven, insight-led solutions in the areas of people, risk and capital across more than 140 countries. 

 

 

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