Is your insurance data safe from hackers?
May 27, 2015 by Matthew Patane, mpatane@dmreg.com
For hackers, the insurance industry is a virtual treasure trove of data.
It’s one-stop shopping for data thieves, with a smorgasbord of consumer information — medical, financial and personal — all in one place.
In recent months a handful of insurance companies have announced security breaches, including Anthem, Premera and CareFirst, that resulted in more than 90 million customer records exposed.
It’s why data, security and innovation will take center stage this week as several hundred insurance professionals descend on downtown Des Moines for the second annual Global Insurance Symposium.
The event kicks off Tuesday, with the shadow of those recent data breaches still weighing heavily on the industry.
“We’ve had the Anthem breach, the Premera breach, every time you open the paper you have a breach on something,” Iowa Insurance Commissioner Nick Gerhart said.
A three-day gathering, the first conference drew about 300 insurance professionals to the city to discuss insider issues, such as capital standards and regulatory changes.
Gerhart and other organizers said they want to emphasize cybersecurity, innovation and “big data” to expand the conference’s appeal.
“Those are all three huge issues that are driving the industry right now,” said Jay Byers, CEO of The Greater Des Moines Partnership.
The conference will also serve as a graduation of sorts for six startups making there way through the Global Insurance Accelerator, a fast-track business development program focused on insurance innovation.
That’s especially important in Des Moines, where the insurance industry is such a big player in the area’s economy. Central Iowa’s insurance hub boasts more than 24,000 employees working in the field.
DES MOINES REGISTER Tech Spotlight: Brothers unify vision in accelerator
‘More organized, more strategic’ breaches
Earlier this year, Anthem, Premera and CareFirst announced separate breaches of their systems that exposed customer information.
As attacks become more sophisticated, computer security experts have said, hackers are focusing less on the individual and more on business. Instead of going after one person’s information at a time, hacks on retailers and other companies can offer a large amount of information in one go.
“Ten or 20 years ago there were lone-wolf hackers that were mostly grandstanding … now it’s a really specialized industry with supply chains,” said Doug Jones, an associate professor of computer science at the University of Iowa.
Hackers have become more sinister and sophisticated in their targets, they said.
“It’s not necessarily, I always joke, the kid in his underwear anymore having fun,” Gerhart said. “It’s something that’s more organized, more strategic and more patient.”
DES MOINES REGISTER Tech Spotlight: Drive Spotter builds for autonomous car era
Lucrative targets
Those tendencies have made health care and insurance companies more attractive targets, because of their troves of customer data.
“You can bet there are people devoting significant amounts of time sniffing the back doors,” Jones said.
Anthem, for instance, said its breach gave attackers access to names, birthdays, medical IDs, Social Security numbers, addresses and employment information.
“The biggest issue is these companies have to get it right every day, because the bad actors are going to be there every day — waiting for them to not get it right one day,” Gerhart said.
Those threats can become the topic of everyday conversation at some insurance firms.
“We have a responsibility to our customers to make sure that we’re … doing everything we can to protect the information,” said Thomas Swank, the new CEO of Des Moines-based American Enterprise Group. “We need the information in order to provide the products that we do, but then we need to be good stewards of that information.”
DES MOINES REGISTER Tech Spotlight: LifeDB rooted in founders’ personal experiences
Changing insurance
While part of the Global Insurance Symposium will focus on the scarier aspects of technology such as hacking, another part will focus on the good: innovation.
Brian Hemesath, the accelerator’s managing director, said new applications, fitness bands and the Internet of Things (the network of objects embedded with electronics, sensors and connectivity) can open the door for better insurance coverage.
“All these new technologies are going to change everything about how things are insured,” he said. “You’re going to have more information, you may even have less risk.”
Insurance companies are looking for new ways to connect with customers by using data and other technology, Thomas Swank, the new CEO of Des Moines-based American Enterprise Group, said.
“Innovation and the way we look at our business, we’ve got to be vigilant , we’ve got to keep looking, we’ve got to experiment, we’ve got to try different things,” he said.
Hemesath and others hope the accelerator start-ups can provide some insight into insurance innovation. The six start-ups have focused on different aspects of the insurance market, including life and travel insurance, tracking driver behavior and helping speech pathologists report to insurers.
On Wednesday, the teams will wrap a 100-day experience with a presentation in front of insurance professionals that are potential customers. Each team will get six minutes to put their best foot forward.
Hemesath said the pitches are more than just putting a glossy finish on 100 days of work.
“The challenge is anybody can weave a good story, but that story has to have a lot of truth behind it: who are you building solutions for, how far along have you come, what have you discovered along the way,” he said.
DES MOINES REGISTER Tech Spotlight: Iowa State students follow own path with ClinicNote
Insurance symposium here to stay
Des Moines is unlikely to see the insurance symposium disappear any time soon.
Organizers have their heart set on making it an annual event and cite the World Food Prize as an inspiration.
“We are already looking at booking days for next year,” Jay Byers, CEO of The Greater Des Moines Partnership, said. “We want to keep this going for as long as we can, as long as we can keep this fresh and provide a strong value” for insurance professionals.
Byers has said the Spring symposium is meant to act as a bookend to the World Food Prize in the Fall. Organizers are also looking at the World Food Prize for inspiration to keep the symposium going.
“Ken Quinn and his team have been masterful in terms of, every year, keeping that event fresh,” Byers said. “For us, we want to be able to keep this fresh and continue to have different themes with what’s really important” for insurance.
Byers and Iowa Insurance Commissioner Nick Gerhart both view the symposium as a way to get eyes on central Iowa’s insurance hub, which boasts more than 24,000 employees working in the field.
“For insurance leaders from across the world to view Des Moines as a key global insurance hub, a thought leader, puts (us) in a pretty good position,” Byers said. “It’s a place where, if you’re in the industry, you want your business to be or you want to spend some significant time here.”
