Cyber Insurance: The Right Policy Starts Before the Claim

Cyber insurance is a specialised insurance product that covers financial losses arising from cybersecurity incidents, including ransomware attacks, data breaches, business interruption caused by system failures, and third-party liability for personal data breaches under the GDPR. In Spain, cyber policies are underwritten under general insurance law (Ley 50/1980 del Contrato de Seguro) and DGSFP oversight, with no dedicated regulatory framework for cyber risk coverage. The EU's DORA Regulation (2022/2554) requires financial entities to incorporate cyber risk transfer — including insurance — as part of their ICT risk management framework, increasing demand for robust cyber coverage across the financial sector.

Our digital risk advisory team combines technical cybersecurity knowledge with expertise in insurance markets and claims management. This allows us to advise organisations throughout the full cyber risk lifecycle: from risk quantification for underwriters to claims defence when an incident occurs.

The Policy Gap That Remains Hidden Until the Claim

Cyber insurance has moved from a niche product to a standard requirement for any organisation dependent on digital systems. But the market has evolved so rapidly that most companies have not kept pace: policies written three or four years ago under very different underwriting conditions, exclusions introduced in successive renewals without sufficient analysis, or sublimits on critical items (ransomware, business interruption) that do not correspond to real exposure.

The moment these gaps are discovered should not be during a claim. Our critical policy review is the first service we provide, and it consistently reveals significant discrepancies between what the client believes is covered and what is actually covered. The most frequent exclusions we encounter: nation-state attack clauses (war exclusions that have expanded to cover sophisticated cyber operations), failures of cloud provider systems not covered under the insured’s policy, or incidents caused by the insured’s own employees (many policies exclude internal negligence in ways that would apply to the most common attack vector — phishing).

The Rising Underwriting Bar

Insurers have substantially raised the minimum technical requirements for cyber policy underwriting. Multi-factor authentication, optional five years ago, is now a subscription condition for virtually all market underwriters. The same applies to EDR endpoint detection and response solutions, tested offsite backups, and a documented incident response plan. We coordinate with the cybersecurity audit service to enable companies to demonstrate these controls in a documented, rigorous form that satisfies underwriter scrutiny.

The underwriting questionnaire has itself become a technical document requiring careful preparation. Misrepresentation on a cyber insurance questionnaire — whether through inaccuracy or omission — is grounds for claim denial and, in some cases, policy avoidance. We prepare questionnaire responses that are accurate, comprehensive, and presented in the context that positions the organisation’s risk profile most favourably.

Claims: Where Expertise Matters Most

Claims management is where our advisory delivers the most critical value. Insurers have specialist teams focused on limiting indemnification; the insured organisation needs independent expertise that understands the policy in detail, interprets the technical incident narrative accurately, and defends the insured’s interests throughout the process.

Coordination with the incident response team ensures that incident documentation simultaneously satisfies regulatory requirements (AEPD, NIS2 supervisor) and the insurer’s evidentiary requirements. These are not always the same: what satisfies a data protection authority may not be what satisfies an insurer’s adjuster, and vice versa. Managing both from the outset avoids the situation of having incomplete documentation for one audience or the other.

The Pre-Renewal Roadmap

The pre-renewal security roadmap translates the insurer’s risk perception into a prioritised action plan. The controls that most impact premium and coverage capacity are not always the most expensive: implementing MFA across all critical access points, establishing a tested offsite backup process, and documenting the incident response plan can have a measurable impact on renewal terms at relatively low cost. We identify the specific improvements most relevant to the company’s current policy, its insurer’s underwriting criteria, and its realistic budget — producing an ROI-positive security investment plan driven by insurance economics.