Data and information management

Early in its investigation of a major cyber attack, health insurer Anthem shared much of what it knew with other health industry stakeholders, all of whom participate in the HITRUST Cyber Threat Intelligence and Incident Coordination Center.

When the country’s second-largest health insurance company is hacked leaving the personal information of 80 million people vulnerable to identity theft, it’s a watershed moment that cannot be ignored. There is no doubt that this data breach is a wake-up call for a healthcare industry that is lacking when it comes to information security.

The information compromised includes names, birthdates, Social Security numbers, street and e-mail addresses and employee data, including income, Anthem said.

Social, mobile, analytics, big data, cloud and digital strategy soon will be basic capabilities, and insurers that get bogged down in ROI studies could miss opportunities.

The specialty insurer has established a group for catastrophe engineering and analytics, under the leadership of a former AIR Worldwide executive.

The regulatory group has established a task force to evaluate the insurance industry’s skill at protecting sensitive customer data.

A looming labor shortage in insurance has led several industry players to launch a campaign to increase the sector's visibility and desirability while promoting science, technology, engineering and math.

Inadequate systems outranked talent and capital resources in a Towers Watson poll of insurer pain points.

Four steps CIOs need to take to lead insurance organizations to greater “customer obsession.”

Financial losses due to insurance fraud cost U.S. insurers at least $80 billion a year, according to the Coalition Against Insurance Fraud, an association of industry, government and consumer organizations. The human cost, in terms of suffering and loss of life, is sky high as well. In an effort to dramatize the scope and depth of the problem, the coalition has singled out what it dubs the worst instances of insurance fraud in 2014. While these seven cases may not be the biggest in terms of total dollars involved, they are remarkable for the brazenness of the crimes and the viciousness of the perpetrators.

Deloitte’s Sam Friedman suggests the industry can use its influence to impact the national agenda.

Insurers must choose between embracing innovation or just continuing with business as usual and run the risk of becoming a casualty in the new competitive battle.

In what has become a buyer’s market, underwriters must get creative to maintain their profitability.

Insurance carriers are dependent on the cloud solutions available to them and even those vendors with other priorities recognize the importance of cloud as a key initiative for the future, according to Celent.

The company in recent months has announced several big cloud computing and analytics wins while also shifting the leadership of global services.

IT spending globally is likely to increase modestly in 2015, according to industry researcher Gartner. But that spending will be uneven and less robust than originally expected. Here's a look at the key trends and what they might mean for the insurance industry.

Developing a usage-based insurance program has now gotten easier.

Numerous companies are finding innovative ways to use IoT devices.

Marketing executives continue their march into the insurance data center.

Dan Daniel will serve as Crawford’s VP of catastrophe services, focusing on strategic growth and service delivery.