Winners and highly commended announced for Cyber Insurance Awards USA 2025

At a glittering Awards Ceremony held last night at the Union League Club of Chicago hosted by the talented comedian, Adam Mamawala, the winners and highly commended entrants for Intelligent Insurer’s Cyber Insurance Awards USA 2025 were revealed. 

The event brought together hundreds of cyber insurance professionals from across the States. Congratulations to all the winners and highly commended recipients who have demonstrated exceptional innovation and excellence in cyber insurance.

The Award Sponsors included: AdvantageGo, The Beckage Firm, CyberReason and cysmo. We are very grateful for their support.

There were 17 company categories and 5 individual categories featuring new categories for 2025 including Cyber Underwriting Technology Provider of the Year, Cyber Insurance Awareness Campaign of the Year and CISO of the Year. 

Company categories

Cyber Insurance Carrier of the Year

Winner: AXA XL

Judges Comment: “AXA XL have shown continued creativity around tough classes of business. They have a strong underwriting philosophy and they’ve done a really good job continuing to grow whilst still paying claims. They’re exploring embedded insurance plays, reducing policy-holder risk, improving accessibility for their clients and overall they make all of our jobs easier.”

Highly Commended: At-Bay

Cyber Underwriting Team of the Year

Winner: CFC

Judges Comment: “CFC’s underwriting team has worked hard to address the SMB gap and drive growth by attracting first time buyers. They have also undertaken multiple initiatives to demystify cyber insurance for brokers. By educating brokers, demonstrating value, and making cyber insurance accessible, CFC is driving long-term growth and raising the bar for the industry.”

Highly Commended: At-Bay

Cyber Claims Team of the Year (sponsored by Cybereason)

Winner: At-Bay

Judges Comment: “At-Bay is great from a service perspective, a response perspective and engaging with the client perspective. They're very focused on forensic investigations and working to build their own forensic team which is in its early stages. They're empathetic and quick to respond.”

Highly Commended: Beazley

Cyber MGA of the Year

Winner: Resilience

Judges Comment: “Resilience is not afraid of driving worthwhile changes and responding to market conditions. They have the most holistic offering for their clients and take a creative approach to solving real problems.

They have proper, sound, underwriting guidelines and have good leadership particularly when it comes to claims.”

Highly commended: Converge Insurance

Cyber Insurance Broker of the Year

Winner: INSUREtrust a CRC Group Company

Judges Comment: “CRC’s dedication to the market is seen in their creation of new products, continual drive to educate retail brokers and companies, and support clients and retail brokers during the claim process. Consistently thinking out of the box for solutions for all sizes of businesses to successfully match companies with the appropriate insurance.”

Highly commended: Lockton

Cyber Reinsurance Broker of the Year

Winner: Aon Reinsurance Solutions

Judges Comment: “Aon continues to push the boundaries of technology and data modeling in cyber, including thought leadership around events that happened in 2024 such as Change Healthcare and Crowdstrike.”

Highly commended: Guy Carpenter

Cyber Reinsurer of the Year

Winner: Hiscox Re

Judges Comment: “Hiscox's support for both proportional and non-proportional stands out. Their consortium is also highly innovative and new - we commend them on this and also their work on ILS. Their service levels are very good and they write a whole range of products”

Highly commended: Munich Reinsurance America

Cyber Reinsurance Underwriting Team of the Year

Winner: Liberty Mutual Reinsurance

Judges Comment: “Liberty embodies the role of a reinsurer very well, and are willing to support cedents. They’ve doubled the size of their team, clearly showing their commitment to investing in cyber. They have strong leadership, service, approachability, and culture. They support both large and small businesses and work hard to understand client positions in order to come up with the best solutions.”

Cyber Insurtech of the Year

Winner: Safe Security

Judges Comment: “Safe Security made an excellent submission with testimonials and references, they've done some really cool stuff. They are really changing and professionalising the cyber insurance conversation.”

Highly commended: CyberCube

Cyber Insurance Awareness Campaign of the Year

Winner: ProWriters

Judges Comment: “ProWriters has an impressive reach - the spirit of their campaigns is to convince as many as possible, especially SMEs, of the value of cyber insurance. They succeed in influencing a broad range of buyers without leaning on one specific offering.”

Highly commended: Arctic Wolf

Cyber Insurance Incident Response Provider of the Year

Winner: Surefire Cyber

Judges Comment: “Not only the great work which Surefire Cyber are doing in this space, but also the breadth of their offering was a key consideration. The data they are now providing makes them stand out, as does their overall support of the insurance community as a whole, which they go out of their way to do.”

Highly commended: Charles River Associates

Cyber Security Consulting Services Provider of the Year

Winner: MOXFIVE

Judges Comment: “MOXFIVE has shown a commitment to growth, reflected in both their corporate and talent acquisitions in the past year. They have strong leadership and are a one-stop shop which makes them very attractive to breach coaches and carriers alike. They are also easily accessible from a sales and business development perspective, meaning that if any issues arise, the team is very easy to get in contact with and resolve any such issues.”

Highly commended: Arctic Wolf

Cyber Security Solution Provider of the Year

Winner: Darkweb IQ

Judges Comment: “They are helping the industry move forward with a better risk posture and empowering underwriters by providing insights into threat patterns. Plus, they ensure the policyholder takes a proactive role. It’s these preventative measures, the behavior changes, and their flexibility that really sets themselves apart.”

Highly commended: KnowBe4

Cyber Insurance Technology Provider of the Year

Winner: Safe Security

Judges Comment: “Safe Security stood out from their peers in 2024 in innovation and thought leadership. They have continued to push the bounds in risk quantification and cyber and underwriting through their partnerships with brokers and carriers to the benefit of clients and the market.”

Highly commended: CyberCube

Cyber Law Firm of the Year (Sponsored by Cybereason)

Winner: Constangy, Brooks, Smith & Prophete

Judges Comment: “Constangy's HIPAA expertise is phenomenal and their attention to detail and their understanding of varied Cyber Laws is truly remarkable. There are great individual examples of where they have stepped in to assist the client in consultative (non-schooling) ways, which is healthy for the industry. Certain individuals were accredited with helping insured clients get out of difficult situations with grace, knowledge and ease.”

Highly commended: Cipriani & Werner

Cyber Insurance SME Initiative of the Year

Winner: Upfort

Judges Comment: “Upfort's submission really focussed on helping SMEs specifically. They had clear examples in their key initiatives (that speak to SMEs) including Streamlined Underwriting Automation, Integrated Cybersecurity Solutions, Claims Reduction and Cost Efficiency.”

Highly commended: Coalition

Cyber Underwriting Technology Provider of the Year

Winner: Safe Security

Judges Comment:  “Safe Security has worked hard to bring together the otherwise disparate ecosystems of enterprise cyber security with cyber insurance, working hard to drive significant efficiency and transparency throughout the entire value chain compared to the traditional underwriting process.”

Highly commended: Bitsight

Individual categories

CISO of the Year

Winner: John Wilson, Chief Information Security Officer and President of Forensics, HaystackID

Judges comment: “John's knowledge and leadership come through his actions every day. He is someone who passionately loves what he does and this is evident through his dedication to technology and his approach to overcoming challenges.”

Highly commended: Kevin Johnson, CISO, The Beckage Firm

Cyber Mentor of the Year

Winner: Kelly Castriotta, Global Executive Underwriting Officer, Markel

Judges comment: “Kelly approaches risk with great thoughtfulness and professionalism. She takes the time to carefully analyze coverage issues, guide individuals through complexities, and even step in to resolve conflicts when needed. With a great demeanor, and a wealth of knowledge, Kelly is a true professional and someone to look up to in the industry.”

Highly commended: Tresa Stephens, Regional Head of Cyber, Tech & Media - North America, Allianz Commercial

Rising Star in Cyber Insurance

Winner: Leah Peckerman, Claims Manager (Cyber/Tech Claims), Liberty Mutual

Judges comment: “Leah's testimonials were particularly strong - the first highlighting how available and responsive she was during a particularly complex matter with multiple vendors being necessary. The insured client spoke particularly highly of her work. The second, speaks to Leah's ability to generate innovative solutions (for her team and the industry at large) in some of the most complex areas. Leah is clearly a well-known and trusted colleague whose ideas regularly advance the industry's response to issues that develop with lightning speed.”

Highly commended: Steven Schwartz, VP, Insurance Strategy & Underwriting, Safe Security

Cyber Insurance Legend

Winner: John Mullen, Partner, Mullen Coughlin

Judges comment: “John Mullen helped to “make” the cyber insurance market. Early on when the market was in the millions of dollars and not the billions it is today and prior to starting the largest US Breach Coach firm Mullen Coughlin with Jenn, John developed solutions to strengthen the value proposition of the insurance product. Without the pre-breach and post-breach services he and his team provide, some Insureds wouldn’t have understood the purpose of cyber insurance and entered the market. Furthermore, John has mentored almost everyone in the room (meaning those in the audience), whether directly or indirectly. He’s been a mentor, a friend, a family to so many of us, and we then have passed it on to others. He cares about the community - his generosity extends to the sponsorships of non-profits and programs that will help grow the talent in our industry.”

Highly commended: Yosha DeLong, Global Head of Cyber, Mosaic Insurance

Inspiring Woman in Cyber Insurance

Winner: Kirsten Mickelson, Cyber Claims Practice Leader, Gallagher Bassett

Judges comment: “Kirsten's inspiring influence in cyber insurance stems from over a decade of experience, during which she has managed thousands of cyber incidents, including data breaches, ransomware attacks, and business interruption losses. At Gallagher Bassett, she leads the cyber practice group, developing standards and strategies to navigate the rapidly expanding cyber market. Mickelson is also a frequent speaker on cyber-related panels, sharing her insights on emerging threats and best practices. She leads with empathy and hard work and her commitment to advancing cyber resilience and her ability to adapt to evolving threats make her a leading figure in the cyber insurance industry.”

Highly commended: Jennifer Beckage, Managing Director, The Beckage Firm

Click here to view the full list of winners and highly commended

“It was fantastic to see the winners of the Cyber Insurance Awards USA receive their trophies. This is a truly innovative sector and we were all extremely impressed by the diversity and innovation of the entries. The judges had some incredibly hard decisions to make and we were thrilled to be able to present the winners and highly commended with their trophies and recognise their hard work and contributions to the industry. Congratulations to all the winners, and thank you to our sponsors, judges, and nominees for contributing to making this event a tremendous success!,” said Aditi Mathur, Deputy Editor, Intelligent Insurer.

During the course of a few weeks at the end of 2024, the independent panel of expert judges read the entries and using a process of scoring and meetings, selected the winners for each category. Each of the judges had been carefully selected for their knowledge and expertise and only judged the categories in which they have no conflict of interest.

The expert independent judging panel can be viewed here.

Nominations will open in the summer of 2025 for the 2026 edition of the awards which are set to return to Chicago. If you're interested in being a nominee, judge, or sponsor, then please email us.

For further information regarding the awards see - https://www.cyber-insurance-awards-usa.com/cyberusaawards2025/

or contact: Gina Baillie, Senior Researcher & Producer, Intelligent Insurer on gbaillie@intelligentinsurer.com 

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