International insurance brokerage firm Arthur J. Gallagher & Co has confirmed that it was the target of a ransomware attack on September 26th.
The firm said the incident impacted a “limited portion” of its internal systems, and does not expect it to have a material impact on its operations or financial condition.
“We promptly took all of our global systems offline as a precautionary measure, initiated response protocols, launched an investigation, engaged the services of external cybersecurity and forensics professionals, and implemented our business continuity plans to minimize disruption to our customers,” Arthur J. Gallagher reported.
Following the attack, the broker also restarted most of its business systems.
Cyber attacks, and ransomware in particular, have increased significantly over the course of 2020 due in part to the growing reliance on remote working.
A report by Beazley found that ransomware attacks spiked by 25% in Q1 compared to the last quarter of 2019. And this was after ransomware incidents already “skyrocketed” throughout 2019.
Rating agency AM Best has similarly warned that re/insurers need to rethink and enhance their stress tests due to the notable uptick in cyber incidents this year.
