Cost, convenience, and compliance: The value for insurers of the Forrester Total Economic Impact Study

“We’re now identifying the greatest risks in our external infrastructure, the stuff that any hacker with one day of experience can figure out. Honestly, the ability to have all this third-party risk information aggregated and presented in a usable way for both us and the supplier is a game changer.”

–Senior Director of Information Protection, Insurance

The growing sophistication of threat actors, supply chain disruptions, and the potential for systemic and catastrophic losses make for a precarious landscape for insurers and those seeking insurance. To help customers reduce risk at scale, insurers and brokers must adopt technology in order to visualize vulnerabilities while also forecasting, quantifying, and monitoring risks.

SecurityScorecard delivered an ROI of 176%

With this in mind, SecurityScorecard commissioned a Forrester Total Economic Impact^TM (TEI) Study to examine the benefits of the platform. One of the most notable findings from the TEI study was the significant return on investment (ROI) that was experienced by a composite organization representative of interviewed customers implementing SecurityScorecard’s platform. The Forrester study found an ROI of 176% over three years, which indicates that the benefits outweighed the costs associated with adoption and integration. Additionally, the composite company experienced benefits of $6.0 million over three years versus costs of $2.2 million, adding up to a net present value (NPV) of $3.9 million.

To arrive at these conclusions, Forrester interviewed four representatives at organizations using the SecurityScorecard platform to obtain data about costs, benefits, and risks. One representative works as a Senior Director of Information Protection in the insurance industry. For this customer, the value of SecurityScorecard’s platform lies in its cost savings, convenience, and assistance in meeting industry compliance requirements.

“SecurityScorecard is effective at helping us build trending reports, showing areas where we need improvement in our third-party cyber risk operations.”

–Senior Director of Information Protection, Insurance

Unmasking third-party risk

It’s estimated that 54% of organizations have an insufficient understanding of cyber vulnerabilities in their supply chain. SecurityScorecard’s Global Third-Party Cybersecurity Breach Report found that 75% of third-party breaches targeted the software and technology supply chain. This has been underscored in the last few years, with several high-profile data breaches attributed to SolarWinds, Log4j, and MOVEit. With third-party risks increasing at such a rapid pace, it’s imperative for organizations to be able to identify vulnerabilities in their vendor ecosystems. The senior director of information protection in the insurance industry interviewed in the Forrester study agrees, saying: “SecurityScorecard is effective at helping us build trending reports, showing areas where we need improvement in our third-party cyber risk operations.”

“For our critical vendors, we perform basic and onsite assessments, annual reviews, and continuous monitoring to comply with required industry regulations and meet the standards required by our outsourcing partners.”

–Senior Director of Information Protection, Insurance

Compliance

Additionally, SecurityScorecard helps organizations in meeting regulatory requirements and industry standards by providing continuous and accurate vendor risk monitoring, benchmarking, prioritizing, and reporting. “For our critical vendors, we perform basic and onsite assessments, annual reviews, and continuous monitoring to comply with required industry regulations and meet the standards required by our outsourcing partners,” notes the senior director of information protection.

“To do what SecurityScorecard does for us would take a team of 10 new security engineers. It would be totally cost prohibitive to build a program like this and bring all the needed data together.”

–Senior Director of Information Protection, Insurance

Convenient and cost-effective

Oftentimes, even the most well-funded organizations still lack the resources needed to adequately invest in cybersecurity. But according to the Insurance Director, SecurityScorecard eases this burden: “To do what SecurityScorecard does for us would take a team of 10 new security engineers. It would be totally cost prohibitive to build a program like this and bring all the needed data together.”

With a comprehensive, automated cyber risk platform, SecurityScorecard helps organizations effectively manage their security engineering needs, to handle the increased demands of expanding vendor network monitoring, while also enhancing third-party security posture without the need for additional hires. According to the Forrester study, the composite organization saved more than $3.8 million over three years by avoiding security engineering hires.

Final thoughts

As businesses endeavor to meet the ever-growing demands of the digital  world, harnessing SecurityScorecard’s solutions becomes a strategic imperative and a competitive advantage. With continuous attack surface and vendor monitoring, as well as real-time data on third-party threats, SecurityScorecard offers enterprises a platform to monitor and manage digital third-party, supply chain, and attack surface vulnerabilities.

The Forrester TEI study for SecurityScorecard offers valuable insights into the platform’s impact. The study’s key findings demonstrate and quantify, based on real SecurityScorecard and customer data, the platform’s impact on enhancing security, improving productivity, and delivering substantial financial benefits.

With its comprehensive, automatic vendor detection, risk identification, and mitigation features, enterprises can holistically manage their online risk exposure within the critical third-party space. Strong API capabilities and automation enable organizations to avoid costly breaches and achieve significant efficiencies.

For those  who specialize the cyber insurance underwriting, our cyber insurance solution helps businesses of all sizes and in all industries effectively identify, measure and resolve cyber threats. Share this site with them today.

And to find out more, download The Total Economic Impact™ Of The SecurityScorecard Platform here.