Cyber for Plan Sponsors

The Sony Hack Shows How Vulnerable Your Retirement Plan Is

05.29.2019

Sony is one of the largest companies in the world. Its products include everything from movies to cameras to financial services. Its 2014 hack should show you that even if their information is vulnerable to cyber attack, your retirement plan is at risk as well.

Sony was hacked through undetectable malware on their computer system that stole and wiped their data including pre-release movies and private emails of top executives including Amy Pascal. New viruses are generally undetectable until discovered and cataloged by anti-virus software and that could easily happen to your plan as well. Your anti-virus system just probably won’t be able to contain new and devastating computer viruses. These types of attacks have been commonplace for over 20 years and just keep morphing to get around existing anti-virus precautions.

The scariest part is that Sony was previously hacked in 2011, through its Playstation Network, and the precautions it took after were still not enough to stop cyber attackers in 2014. While precautions may help deter certain attacks, they by no means are a means to completely stop attacks. There’s only one way to make sure that you and your company are protected in the event of a cyber attack: Cyber Liability Insurance.

Where can I easily purchase Cyber Liability Insurance to protect my company and retirement plan?

Colonial Surety includes Cyber Liability Insurance with our ERISA Fidelity Bond packages with Fiduciary Liability Insurance to best protect your company and plan against a cyber attack.

Colonial’s cyber insurance provides a services-based solution to help plan sponsors manage data breaches successfully. These services include a dedicated team of cyber breach professionals who assist plan sponsors at every stage of incident investigation and breach response. These professionals coordinate the carefully vetted forensics experts and specialized lawyers to help plan sponsors establish what’s been compromised; assess plan sponsor responsibility; and, notify those individuals affected. In addition, these services will also coordinate credit or identity monitoring, and PR advice to help the plan sponsor safeguard its reputation. Of course, Colonial’s cyber insurance also indemnifies and defends plan sponsors from covered lawsuits or regulatory actions, the risk of which may be reduced by a well-coordinated breach response, but can never be completely eliminated.

Ongoing governance and evaluation of recordkeepers can help protect data, but the only way to fully protect against a potential cyber attack’s data breach is to purchase Cyber Liability Insurance from Colonial Surety Company.