Hello. and welcome to Protocol Enterprise! Today: how cloud providers are working with customers and insurance companies to share operating data, why a Google chip veteran just joined a new silicon photonics startup and how CISA is putting the finishing touches on a new plan for responding to cyberattacks and vulnerabilities.
How to fix cyber insurance
Cybersecurity insurance, which provides financial protection against damages caused by cyberattacks, seemed like a great idea at the time.
Then 2021 happened.
- Cyber insurance has been thrown off-kilter by ransomware attacks that have led insurers to rapidly raise prices and pare back coverage, particularly since last year's massive wave of ransomware attacks.
- Many believe that cyber insurance won't be sustainable without giving insurers an inside look at a policyholder's IT environment, through providing data on the security of the customer's configuration.
- And the big cloud providers have that data.
A number of insurance companies are finding that working directly with cloud providers may be a better way to provide coverage and set rates.
- Global insurance giant Munich Re, for instance, has been working with Google Cloud and insurer Allianz on a policy that aims to provide customers with lower costs, coverage for a broader set of cyber risks and greater transparency into the entire process.
- "Transparency hasn't been our strongest suit in the cyber insurance marketplace up until now," said Bob Parisi, Munich Re's head of cyber solutions for North America. "But transparency and being data-driven are probably the way to increase the sustainability of the cyber insurance market."
- Meanwhile, Microsoft has partnered with At-Bay on a policy focused around the use of the cloud-based Microsoft 365 productivity suite.
- And AWS has teamed up with Cowbell Cyber and Swiss Re to provide insurance coverage of workloads running in its cloud.
For the cloud providers, the cyber insurance programs each act as an incentive for customers to rely more heavily on their respective cloud-based services.
- According to Microsoft and At-Bay, for customers that implement security controls such as MFA, the savings on a cyber insurance policy can reach as high as 15%, compared to At-Bay’s regular pricing.
- The Google Cloud policy offers coverage for workloads running in its cloud that’s broader than would be available for insuring assets in any other type of IT environment as well as potentially lower pricing.
- In other words, the more Google Cloud you use, the more benefits you get on your cyber insurance, according to Monica Shokrai, head of business risk and insurance at the company.
- Ultimately, for both insurers and customers, "we're providing a solution that helps them in an area that is particularly difficult at this point in time," Shokrai told me.
A MESSAGE FROM VMWARE
VMware sits at the center of the multi-cloud universe and is focused on providing consistency across clouds, enabling choice of location and delivering best of breed capabilities. Join thousands of peers, hundreds of experts and VMware leaders at VMware Explore on the journey to remake the cloud, together.
Seeing the light
A promising new technology has begun to emerge that has the potential to help improve the performance of large chiplet designs, while at the same time reduce the amount of power needed to run them as well as the heat generated as a byproduct. Called silicon photonics, the basic idea is to move data around chips by using light in combination with electricity, an approach that could be used for other new ideas such as the chiplet.
Big companies such as Intel are actively researching it, but it has also attracted a batch of startups that are attempting to develop new data-center-focused products, too. One called Lightmatter has succeeded in luring veteran engineers from the likes of Intel and now Google.
Last week, Lightmatter hired former Google AI chip engineer Richard Ho to run its silicon engineering division, where he will be responsible for its AI accelerator and an interconnect technology the company recently demonstrated at a chip conference.
Ho told Protocol that he left Google because it had become increasingly clear that the amount of heat generated by a system had reached a point where it was both difficult to cool and provide power. Silicon photonics technology represents a fundamentally different way to break through that barrier and achieve an entirely new level of power and performance.
“But we are still relatively early in understanding what that means, and what the best technology for chiplet communication is,” Ho said. “And I think what we have seen here is a convergence of silicon photonics being in a place where it can address that market, and the foundries coming on board to implement it in a meaningful way, so as to be able to deploy it.”
— Max A. Cherney (email | twitter)Around the enterprise
Next week CISA plans to roll out a new three-year plan for coordinating with private industry on security threats and responses, according to POLITICO.
VMware introduced a new infrastructure-management software product at its VMware Explore conference, promising customers a new way to manage workloads across multiple cloud providers and on-premises data centers.
Google announced a new bug bounty program focused on its stable of open-source projects, such as Angular and Golang.A MESSAGE FROM VMWARE
VMware sits at the center of the multi-cloud universe and is focused on providing consistency across clouds, enabling choice of location and delivering best of breed capabilities. Join thousands of peers, hundreds of experts and VMware leaders at VMware Explore on the journey to remake the cloud, together.
Thanks for reading — see you tomorrow!