Kathmandu. Inaccurate risk assessment has become one of the biggest challenges for cyber insurance companies. That’s because evolving threats complicate underwriting and pricing.
According to GlobalData’s Q1 2026 survey of Verdict media sites, 32.1% of insurance industry respondents cited accurate cyber risk assessment as the biggest barrier to providing cyber cover.
Then there was common risk management. In which 20.2 percent of the respondents mentioned this. This includes situations where multiple customers are affected by the same cyber attack. This can increase the claim cost.
According to GlobalData, cyber underwriting remains difficult. That’s because insurance companies can’t rely on complete historical data, unlike traditional insurance lines. As hackers use more advanced technologies, cyber risks are constantly changing.
The rapid use of artificial intelligence (AI) in cyberattacks has added another layer of uncertainty, GlobalData said. Other challenges identified in the survey include lack of historical data for cyber insurance (11.0 per cent), helping customers reduce cyber risk (9.2 per cent), premium costs (6.4 per cent), managing claims arising out of cyber incidents (3.7 per cent) and lack of reinsurance availability (2.8 per cent). ’
GlobalData recommends that insurance companies actively monitor new threats. “We need to optimize our underwriting methods to improve efficiencies and profitability,” the firm said.
Bitriz Benito, chief insurance analyst at GlobalData, said smaller insurers may not yet have the capacity to offer cyber insurance. “However, larger providers have different perspectives on this risk,” she said. –Agency
