Cyber attacks appear to be proliferating around the world, and a major issue for companies is detecting the attacks before they wreak havoc with the organization's data. Companies with strong information technology departments and attentive risk managers often believe that they're well protected, but that may not be the case.

To help companies deal with this problem, Marsh, a global insurance broker and risk management consulting firm, and FireEye Inc., a company focused on stopping advanced cyber attacks before they happen, today announced a collaboration to offer clients Marsh Cyber OASIS (Objective Assessment Scorecard of Information Security). The service evaluates an organization's ability to detect and respond to cyber attacks and the strength of the technical infrastructure in use by the organization.

"Large data breaches have led to pricing and capacity volatility in the cyber insurance market, especially in the retail and health care sectors," says Thomas Reagan, Marsh's Cyber Practice leader. "Although companies are spending millions of dollars on cybersecurity controls and capabilities, the effectiveness of these investments is not always clear to underwriters. Through our collaboration with FireEye, we can help clients provide the objective and more detailed information that will help insurance markets to better understand their risk profile."