Claims payments in cyber insurance increase significantly – Finlex confirms GDV statistics

According to the latest GDV statistics, insurers’ claim payments in cyber insurance exceed premium income. Finlex can basically confirm the trend observed from its own claims and coverage practice. Despite rising premiums and lower limits, however, it is still possible for companies to take out risk-appropriate cyber insurance. However, companies are encouraged to constantly invest in IT security measures.

GDV statistics – premiums, benefits and loss ratios in cyber insurance

The German Insurance Association (GDV) recently published its statistics for 2021 on premiums, benefits and loss ratios in cyber insurance (GDV release of 07.09.2022). Not surprisingly, GDV Chief Executive Jörg Asmussen comes to the conclusion that losses in cyber insurance are rising faster than premium income. Premiums had risen from 106 million euros to 178 million euros, while insurers’ benefits grew from 37 million euros in 2020 to 137 million euros in 2021. After the claims had been settled, the claims ratio was around 124%, so that the bottom line was that insurers were incurring considerable losses. According to GDV, the high loss ratio is due in particular to the fact that attacks are becoming more professional and more frequent. At the same time, GDV emphasises that noticeably fewer claims were incurred in the first half of 2022 and that such strong fluctuations are not unusual for a young market.

Finlex confirms the trend identified by GDV

However, the GDV’s figures are not easily transferable to the entire cyber insurance business, as only 39 insurers who are members of the GDV participate in the cyber statistics. Dr. Sven Erichsen, Non-Executive Director at Finlex, estimates the premium volume of 178 million euros quoted by the GDV to be considerably higher for the German market: “We assume a premium volume of approx. 350-400 million euros due to the strong increase in demand and the premium adjustments that already increased in the previous year. In the coming years, the German market will also continue to grow strongly, so that we can assume an estimated 750 million to 1 billion euros by 2025.”

Nevertheless, Finlex can confirm the trend identified by the GDV from its own claims experience. Although the IT infrastructure of many companies has improved considerably in recent years, cyber attacks cannot always be averted. In particular, the steady professionalisation of hacker groups means that successful attacks occur time and again.