What is cyber insurance?
Cyber insurance is designed to help protect your business from the financial impact of computer hacking or a data breach.
Do Salons need Cyber Insurance?
If your business has a website or has electronic records you will want to consider cyber protection. Given that most salons now use an online booking system, what will happen to your business if a hacker locks your website and demands a ransom?
For practices that store consultation forms electronically, what would the impact be if those systems were attacked? Not only have you lost access to important client information but now you will have to report the privacy breach.
Given the type of sensitive personal information salons collect from their clients, this exposes salons as a target for cyber attackers.
Common Misconceptions
You may say, “the salon software company I use will fix it”. This isn’t always true. If the software company is hacked on their end, then yes they will probably fix their own system breach. However, if your systems are hacked you will need to fix it.
“I have an IT provider that will fix it”, while cyber insurance does cover the cost of IT experts to find and fix the breach, it also covers so much more than the just IT experts. It also covers the financial lost your business has suffered due to a cyber incident.
For example:
Regulatory beach liability – covers legal expenses and the costs of fines arising from investigation by a government regulator. For example, breaching the privacy act, which could happen to your salon if you collect client information.
Business Interruption – covers the financial loss you may suffer as a result of a cyber attack. For example, your online store is hacked and you lose product sales.
Cyber extortion – covers the cost of a cyber attack such as hiring negotiation experts, covering extortion demands and prevention of future attacks
Electronic data replacement – The costs of recovering or replacing your records and other business data.
Claim Scenarios
Scenario 1 – A salon manager received an email from what they thought was a supplier advising they had a bill outstanding and requested payment. The staff member then transferred payment only to find out later it was not their supplier but instead was a malicious social engineered email.
Scenario 2 – The salon used a VoIP telephone system which hackers gained access to. This resulted in multiple unauthorised calls to a premium number over a period of four weeks. These calls cost the insured over $35,000.
Scenario 3 – A salon’s network was hacked which resulted in the hackers gaining access to the salon’s systems which contained client’s personal information including credit card information. The hackers then made several fraudulent credit card transactions using client’s credit cards.
**Disclaimer, these scenarios are for illustrative purposes only and are designed to show how a potential claim could arise in your salon**
How likely are you to experience a cyber incident?
One in five small businesses experience a cyber incident.
What limit should my salon get for Cyber Insurance?
As brokers we can’t tell you what limit to get but we can give you some general advice. The average cyber claim varies between insurers, with some insurers telling us it's roughly $50,000 and others telling us it's more, however with cyber incidents rapidly on the rise, we normally recommend getting at least $1,000,000.
How do I get a Cyber Insurance Quote for my Salon?
Luckily obtaining a cyber insurance quote is easy. Simply call us on 07 3135 7436 or email us at info@salonsure.com.au.
General Advice Warning
This information has been prepared without taking into account your objectives, financial
situation or needs. You must consider the insurers exclusions, endorsements, terms & conditions when obtaining cyber insurance and therefore assess whether it is appropriate, in the light of your own individual circumstances.
