Coalition CEO Motta talks cybersecurity with Biden
The cyber insurer pledges to give every U.S. business free access to its cybersecurity risk assessment and monitoring platform.
Coalition, Inc. CEO Joshua Motta met with President Joe Biden as part of a broader White House summit held to support the administration’s goal of pooling private and public resources and expertise to confront cyber threats while bolstering national cybersecurity, the cyber insurance company reports.
“We’ve seen time and again how the technologies we rely on — from our cell phones to pipelines, to the electric grid — can become targets of . . . hackers and criminals,” Biden said in a speech following the Aug. 25 meeting. “At the same time, our skilled cybersecurity workforce has not grown fast enough to keep pace. We’re about — the estimates many of you have given us, and we’ve concluded are — on our own — about a half a million cybersecurity jobs remain unfilled. That’s a challenge, but it also is a real opportunity.”
The meeting was also attended by representatives from Resilience Cyber Insurance Solutions as well as the president’s national security advisers, academic leaders and executives from major technology firms ranging from Amazon and Google to Apple and IBM.
A major theme of the meeting, according to Motta, was the sharing of information. He notes there is a surprising amount of data available on cyberattacks, including the root causes.
“Most events go unreported in the news, particularly if they don’t include protected information,” he says. “Insurance is one area that has captured all of this cyberattack information and can share it more broadly. It is one of the reasons for our commitment to publishing biannual claims reports.”
The need for public & private partnership
Noting the president was clear the problem of cybersecurity is too large for the government to handle on its own, Motta tells PropertyCasualty360.com: “Traditionally, cybersecurity is thought of as a technology problem. We rely on companies like Apple, Google and Microsoft to help, and they are, but it is now becoming clear that this is a whole industry problem. And a risk management problem specifically.”
To this end, Coalition has pledged to give every business in the U.S. free access to Coalition Control, its cybersecurity risk assessment and continuous monitoring platform that was previously only available to policyholders. U.S. businesses can access the platform effective immediately, according to a White House press release.
While around six out of 100 cyber insurance policyholders had an insurable loss this past year, only about two out of 100 Coalition policyholders filed a claim, according to Motta, who explains a proactive approach to monitoring and assessing cyber risks is critical.
“By providing that information, we can dramatically lower the frequency of loss,” he tells PC360. “There will be no costs, no time limits and no strings attached for businesses to use it. We are already collecting this data. It is what powers our underwriting capabilities. We’re just democratizing access to it.”
So what is in it for Coalition? The company will be able to develop a richer data pool, allowing it to further enhance its underwriting capabilities, Motta explains.
“It is a virtuous cycle. The better we do for U.S. businesses, the better we do,” he says.
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