Palos Hills, Ill. - A special online database consisting of motor vehicles and boats affected by Hurricanes Katrina and Rita is being made available to the public, the National Insurance Crime Bureau (NICB), Palos Hills, Ill., reported today.

Chicago - Safeway Insurance Group, Westmont, Ill., is improving its networking infrastructure with an Internet Protocol Virtual Private Network (IP VPN) from AT&T that integrates Safeway's headquarters in Westmont, Ill., with nine offices across the southern and western United States. Based on Multi-Protocol Label Switching (MPLS) technology, the networking solution provides a standardized networking platform with increased bandwidth and secure, high-speed access to Safeway's proprietary applications, e-mail and other operational functions.

Pearl River, N.Y. - ACORD, eEG7 and CSIO today made public the release of a harmonized data dictionary for the insurance industry. This marks the completion of efforts by this international standards bodies coalition, which includes ACORD, the European forum for the development of e-business standards for electronic communication (eEG7) and the Canadian-based Centre for Study of Insurance Operations (CSIO), to harmonize their existing data dictionaries as part of a United Nations initiative.

Chicago - Although insured losses from Hurricane Katrina are estimated at a record high $34.4 billion, the property/casualty insurance industry will weather the storm of more than 1.6 million claims spread out over six states without the market disruption that occurred following 1992's Hurricane Andrew, the previous record-setting storm, according to the Property Casualty Insurers Association of America (PCI), Chicago.

Boston and Plano, Texas - Blue Cross Blue Shield of Massachusetts and Electronic Data Systems Corp. (EDS) have amended their eight-year contract by $125 million in additional information technology (IT) services from EDS. The contract began in January 2004 and the relationship between the two companies originated in 1969."Over the course of our long relationship, EDS has developed a deep understanding of our business, and the EDS team has demonstrated their commitment to our constant goal to improve health care service," says Carl Ascenzo, BCBSMA's chief information officer. "The solutions provided by EDS will provide greater flexibility for our members, account and health care providers while controlling our overall IT costs."

Basking Ridge, N.J., - Allstate Insurance Co., Northbrook, Ill., has deployed Internet protocol (IP) telephony solutions from Avaya Inc. (NYSE:AV) in new locations in the United States and Canada.Allstate is using Avaya's IP-based contact center applications, powered by the Avaya Customer Interaction Suite, to manage customer calls and route them intelligently based on customer-entered criteria. Allstate links its contact centers and manages them as a single, virtual organization--routing customers to the employee best able to handle a claim or inquiry based on language or area of expertise, regardless of where the call originates. As part of the implementation, Allstate has deployed more than 10,000 IP endpoints across its organization.

Long before the power of bits and bytes helped facilitate the insurance industry's growth, forward-moving companies adhered to disciplines and principles that focused on consistent, repeatable processes that enabled cross-functional groups to work more efficiently. In the 1950s, educators were already teaching these principles, and not much has changed in terms of applying good common sense to core business processes.The advent of technology, however, changed the playing field. With automation came simplicity: Paperless audit trails, straight-through processing, real-time communications, wireless, the list goes on. But few would argue that the simplicity offered by technology has brought with it a paradoxical level of mounting complexity. And, for the insurance industry, that complexity isn't just affected by increased competition; it's saddled with regulatory and reporting requirements that make IT management arduous at best. Simply put: the insurance industry's IT organizations are coming out of the cold room to embrace and share knowledge and expertise-via best practices.

A fast-growing market of more than 40 million people, representing $600 billion per year of income, cannot be ignored for too long. The financial services insurance industry is finally learning how to embrace people of Spanish heritage within the United States, and use technology to better respond to this underserved segment.Reaching out to this market involves more than simple translation of documents and Web sites. The Hispanic or Latino market is a highly diverse one. While members of this market are not likely to respond to standard industry pitches, it is a receptive audience to insurance products.

Early in his career, Gary Kaplan spent a decade in loss control engineering, Then he moved into the underwriting arena and found that all the effort he and his colleagues had put into their engineering was arbitrarily applied to underwriting decisions."When I went into underwriting in 1988, I was appalled at how loose it was-the lack of structure and the lack of guidelines," says Kaplan, who is now senior vice president and chief underwriting officer at Zurich. "There was no consistency. The way business was priced was very disappointing to me after 10 years in engineering. I said, 'This is how all my work got translated into a price?'"

U.S. financial service providers (FSPs) are expected to spend $65.7 million on IT services in 2005. However less than 30% will outsource any strategic projects by the end of 2006, according to Gartner Inc., Stamford, Conn."Most FSPs currently use outsourcing tactically to augment staff for faster project turnaround or to reduce operational costs, rather than for strategic value," says Kimberly Harris-Ferrante, research vice president at Gartner. "FSPs should now begin outsourcing strategic projects in order to gain larger-scale, enterprisewide value."

Insurers sell promises, and after Hurricane Katrina, they certainly have a lot of promises to keep.At press time, the economic loss from what appears to be the worst hurricane in U.S. history-along with subsequent flooding of New Orleans-was expected to exceed $125 billion, according to Risk Management Solutions (RMS), a Newark, Calif.-based catastrophe management technology and services provider.

The technology may seem a panacea to some, but for the insurance industry, there are still some unanswered questions concerning Voice over Internet Protocol (VoIP) and data convergence implementation.Donald Light, senior analyst at Boston-based Celent Communications Inc., a research and advisory firm, confirms the pensive posture of the insurance sector. "Insurance is being a cautious adopter. Visualizing the curve, the insurance industry is just now stepping up into growth," he says.

For better or worse, the reinsurance industry is in the middle of its 15 minutes of fame. With regulators shining a spotlight-some might call it a blinding one-on the industry, insurance companies are being forced to take a hard look at their reinsurance practices.Regardless of the overall impact the attention will have on the reinsurance market-specifically on finite reinsurance (see "Regulators Focus on Finite Reinsurance" ), it's a safe bet to say that insurance carriers will start to more closely examine their reinsurance automation needs, according to Donald Light, senior analyst at Celent Communications Inc., a Boston-based financial services research and consulting firm.

Before Keith Hawkyard's employer implemented a Web-based enterprise incentive management (EIM) system, he spent several hours every month leafing thro-ugh paper reports looking for his cancelled accounts.Now, with a new EIM system in place, Hawkyard, who sells automobile and homeowners insurance for San Francisco-based California State Automobile Association (CSAA), spends minutes rather than hours locating those accounts-with more time for follow-up calls to turn those cancellations back into policies.

The evolution of real-time text communications technology, in which messages can be sent, received and viewed immediately-a.k.a. instant messaging (IM)-is a welcome one for most companies.As IM moves from being a novelty for teens and college students to a viable communications vehicle for business, many organizations realize its potential: to improve collaboration and productivity.

San Diego, Calif. - According to a recent report issued by San Diego-based messaging security developer Akonix Systems Inc., some 25 new viruses were reported on corporate IM networks during the month of September.

Boston - In 2003, Allianz Life transformed its Individual Insurance Group Call Center with key features including a single converged voice and data network, voice over Internet protocol (VoIP) phones, simple and understandable 800 number access for agents and policyholders, and intelligent call routing.Allianz's new call center has produced both financial and nonfinancial benefits, according to a report from Celent Communications Inc., titled "Upgrading Call Center Technology at Allianz Life." Productivity (measured by utilization of internal sales reps) has increased from 85% to 92%. Current year sales are up 78% year-over-year with essentially the same staff count. Management has a much better ability to track performance both real-time and retrospectively. Perhaps most importantly, the introduction of skill-based routing has facilitated the matching of calls to sales representatives.

Kansas City, Mo. - State insurance regulators, working cooperatively through the National Association of Insurance Commissioners (NAIC), are working to ensure that survivors of Hurricane Katrina are being treated fairly and in compliance with the state insurance laws. To help respond to consumers' needs, the NAIC is creating an Emergency Responder database of state resources. This database will serve as a network of consumer assistance representatives from around the nation, who will help support state insurance departments in Louisiana, Mississippi and Alabama, as they respond to losses associated with the disaster.

Alexandria, Va. - The national board of the Independent Insurance Agents & Brokers of America (IIABA) has adopted a new policy on producer compensation disclosure by carriers.

New York, N.Y. - The insurance commissioners of several large states will convene a summit November 15 and November 16 to develop a National Catastrophe Insurance Program, which would more effectively spread insurance risk and help survivors cope with the tremendous financial damage caused by natural catastrophes and acts of terrorism.