Insurance industry insiders know an insurance policy is one of the few products purchased that most people hope to never have to put to use. Afterall, “using” your insurance means that an adverse event has occurred – an auto accident, medical crisis, storm damage, or any number of situations where not having a policy in place could have huge financial repercussions.
Insurers also need to have a different form of “insurance” (or software) in place to help reduce the risks they take when transferring sensitive files containing financial records, customers’ personal data, and policy details inside or outside of their organization. Putting a secure file transfer solution in place can deliver peace-of-mind around how securely these sensitive and business critical files are when in transit or at rest.
Insurance Industry is Attractive to Cybercriminals
There’s no question that the personally identifiable information (PII) and financial data exchanged by insurance organizations are high-value targets for cybercriminals. Examples abound, as just these two reveal:
- MCNA Dental was hit in 2023 with one of the year’s largest cyberbreaches in the LockBit ransomware attack, impacting 9 million dental patients.
- A third-party data breach impacted more than 2 million of Aflac’s life insurance policyholders.
According to IBM’s latest report, the insurance and finance sector ranked third in attacks from 2016 to 2020, a clear indication of the need for robust and flexible solutions for storing and exchanging valuable customer data.
Insurance Industry Compliance Needs for a Secure File Transfer Solution
Meeting the multiple compliance requirements of the insurance industry for privacy and data security, such as HIPAA and the GDPR is a heavy lift. Without user-friendly technological solutions to help ease that burden, organizations could easily be susceptible to data breaches, financial and reputational fallout from mishandled data, as well as fines and sanctions from governing agencies.
Insureds provide a host of personal data points including name, birthdate, social security number, and address, all of which are gold to bad actors. Therefore, insurance-related organizations need to earn and keep the trust of their policyholders who count on them to take the necessary measures to protect their PII, as well as any financial, health, and other sensitive information contained in files exchanged or when those files are at rest.
Compliance Requirements Addressed Through MFT
With the myriad requirements insurance organizations must comply with to protect their insureds information, robust managed file transfer solutions offer up a secure and streamlined way to protect those files.
The following insurance requirements can be met by organizations utilizing a managed file transfer solution:
- Sarbanes-Oxley 404 and 409: Secures the integrity of private data required
- Dodd Frank Act: Ensures data is secured both at rest and in transit per Act requirements
- GLBA: Meets information integrity requirements
- GDPR: Secures file transmissions and performs integrity checks as specified
- HIPAA and HITECH: Delivers required audit trails and reports
- PCI DSS: Ensures the security of credit card data that is exchanged
- Medicare/Medicaid: Provides tool for required integrity of data in motion
“Centralizing the file transfer process with a solution that can automate, streamline, and standardize the process can deliver more control and oversight, removing the temptation of busy insurance industry personnel to exchange files with unsecure methods, and putting highly sensitive data at risk for human error or cybercrime,” said Chris Bailey, Senior Product Manager, Fortra.
Fortra’s GoAnywhere MFT offers enterprise-level automation and security that is scalable for even the largest insurance organizations. Automated workflows can streamline multi-step insurance documentation exchanges and the solution’s scalability helps ensure processes are uninterrupted even during large-scale insurance claim events.
One global insurer saw improved visibility and centralization after implementing GoAnywhere. Not only were they able to batch file their transfers, they also gained alerting and notifications, reporting functionality, and visibility within their on-premises and cloud environment. And by making use of Agents, the insurer’s admins could control the entre file transfer process from a single server, for even more visibility and control.
“Waiting on a claim decision can be a stressful time for insureds,” noted Bailey. “With the increased efficiency of files transferred via MFT, the entire exchange of required data can be managed more streamlined, in a standardized fashion, and with less human error risk, speeding up and securing the process to deliver better customer service to covered individuals or organizations.”
Mitigate Insurance Data Risks with GoAnywhere MFT
If insurance is designed to mitigate risks, you need the assurance delivered by a robust file transfer solution to help secure, automate, and maintain the integrity of the multitude of data files exchanged when processing insurance data.
