The Shifting Landscape of Risk: Virtual Social Inflation and Cyber Security Seminar

1. Cyber: Global Market Update and D&O Risk

Description

Participants will learn about three of the latest toolkit installments from the American Academy of Actuaries' Committee on Cyber Risk: an overview of the current global cyber (re)insurance market, SEC cybersecurity disclosure requirements and related D&O liability risk, and vendor models used for cyber systemic modeling. Market and vendor model discussion will apply globally, while the SEC disclosure section will apply specifically to the United States. This session will include audience involvement through storytelling related to the history of the global cyber market, Q&A between presenters and audience, and nominal group technique (anonymous polling) throughout the session to promote engagement and learning.

Learning Objectives

1. Summarize the history and current state of the global cyber market, including performance, growth in emerging markets and alternative risk transfer.
2. Interpret SEC cybersecurity reporting requirements and recognize the potential correlated risk between Cyber and D&O Insurance to organizations.
3. Compare and contrast some of the most common cyber vendor models used in practice

Speakers:

• Samuel Tashima, FCAS, MAAA, MBA (he/him/his) - Sam Tashima is a Director and Actuary at Aon, where he leads highly innovative projects in the specialization of Cyber Quantification, Intellectual Property, and Complex Casualty Risk Analytics. Sam has built a reputation with clients and Aon leaders as a collaborator and problem solver. His consulting experience spans across Fortune 1000, Forbes Global 2000, private, and non-profit entities.

  Sam is responsible for leading financial quantification projects, assisting in the insurance renewal process for clients, and managing client experiences regarding actuarial consulting projects.

  Experience and Expertise

  Sam leads Aon’s North America Cyber Risk Consulting team. Within this role, he focuses on emerging risk data & analytics and financial modeling initiatives relating to cyber, E&O, cryptocurrency crime, and intellectual property – patent infringement.

  Awards / Recognition
  • 2021 Business Insurance Breakout Award Winner
  • 2021 Insurance Business America Rising Stars Award Winner
  
  Education / Professional Designations / Affiliations
  • University of Minnesota (Carlson School of Management), BS in Business
  • University of Minnesota (Carlson School of Management), MBA
  • Fellow of the Casualty Actuarial Society (FCAS), 2013
  • Member of the American Academy of Actuaries (MAAA), 2012
  • Actuarial Advisory Board Member for Michigan State University, 2016 – Present

• Isabelle McCullough, ACAS, MAAA (she/her/hers)  - Isabelle is the Global Head of Cyber Pricing at AXIS. From 2019-2023, Isabelle worked in the Global Cyber & Technology insurance pricing team at AXIS where she supported standalone and package Cyber, Technology E&O, Miscellaneous Professional Liability and Media Liability lines of business. Her experience at AXIS also includes product development and systems implementation for US-based SME business. From 2023 to 2025, she led Cyber Reinsurance pricing at AXIS. 

  Isabelle graduated from the University of Florida in 2013 with a BS in Mathematics and a BA in Economics. She has been an Associate of the Casualty Actuarial Society and a Member of the American Academy of Actuaries since 2020. Isabelle is a 2024 recipient of the American Academy of Actuaries' Rising Actuary award.

• Kathryn (Katie) Koch, FCAS, MAAA - Katie is a Vice President and Principal at Lewis & Ellis, LLC. Katie brings a diverse background of experience through her over 20 years of actuarial work experience in insurance company, regulatory, and consulting environments. Katie’s background is in property & casualty insurance pricing, modelling, reserving and financial reporting. She has experience working with a wide variety of products and coverages spanning both personal lines and commercial lines, including cyber liability and D&O. She consistently strives for effective communication to both actuaries and non-actuaries.

Moderator

• Andrew Li, FCAS - Andrew is currently the VP of Product Innovation at Corix Insurance, A Hiscox company. Andrew leads a cross-functional team charged developing specialty commercial insurance products to meet the needs of complex needs of businesses today and the future.

  Before joining Corix, Andrew was Head of Pricing at Corvus Insurance, an Industry-leading underwriter of Cyber Risk. At Corvus, Andrew leads collaborative teams of actuaries, data scientists, and technologists to solve the most dynamic line of business we have today! Focus areas include pricing, aggregation, capital management, and much more! Andrew joined Corvus as the first actuary because he was excited about working in the very unique intersection of technology and insurance.

2. Inflation, AI, and the Future of Cyber Claims

Description

This session explores the evolving impact of inflation, social inflation and other factors that drive the costs of cyber claims. As a potential contributor to increased claims and an area of increasing industry engagement, the session will also discuss AI and its impacts on the cyber insurance industry.

Learning Objectives

1. Understand the relationship between traditional core and social inflation and cyber insurance claims
2. Explore potential factors on rising costs of cyber insurance claims
3. Explore the impacts of artificial intelligence (AI) in shaping the cyber insurance landscape

Speakers:

• Jess Fung, FCAS, MAAA (she/her/hers) - Jess is Guy Carpenter’s North America Cyber Analytics Lead. She is responsible for overseeing cyber catastrophe and actuarial modeling, advisory services, proprietary data lake creation, and thought leadership research to support Guy Carpenter’s North America and Global clients. She also serves as the Head of Analytics Sales – North America, spearheading various strategic initiatives to deliver consistent, best-in-class analytics contents and insights in RFPs and new business pursuits.
  
  Prior to this role, Jess held the position of Executive Vice President at Willis Re, where she was the Head of Analytics on both the Professional Liability Segment and the Global Cyber Practice Group. Jess previously worked as Vice President at Munich Re America and Actuarial Associate at Tillinghast/Towers Perrin.
  
  Jess has a Bachelor’s Degree with High Distinction in Applied Mathematics from the University of California, Berkeley. She is a Fellow of the Casualty Actuarial Society and a Member of the American Academy of Actuaries.
• Richard B. McCauley - Richard provides cyber modeling and detailed analytics to support client goals. He is a technical expert in cyber vendor models and uses that expertise to equip clients with insights and to foster deeper understanding of modeled outputs. Richard is dedicated to constructing cutting edge infrastructure and tools to create actionable insights from Guy Carpenter’s industry leading data resources.

  Richard joined Guy Carpenter's cyber analytics team with five years of experience with property and workers’ compensation analytics with a focus on creating innovative geospatial solutions and supporting the GIS needs for GC Analytics.

  Richard graduated from the University of Maryland with a bachelor’s degree in Economics and Art History and a minor in Middle East Studies.

• RJ VanTash, ACAS, MAAA - RJ VanTash is an Assistant Vice President on Guy Carpenter's Global Analytics and Advisory Team. In this role, he provides actuarial insights through reinsurance treaty modeling to a wide range of clients. He primarily supports Guy Carpenter's Regional/Mutual segment, as well the Cyber and Public Entity Centers of Excellence. RJ earned his bachelor’s degree in actuarial science from Temple University’s Fox School of Business and is an Associate of the Casualty Actuary Society. He resides in Philadelphia PA and enjoys traveling.
• MJ Teo - MJ Teo is a Senior Vice President in the Cyber Center of Excellence at Guy Carpenter LLC. With ten years of experience as a property and casualty actuary, MJ focuses on delivering data-driven analytical insights to help clients navigate the evolving landscape of cyber claims and refining their risk protection strategies for cyber portfolios. 

  MJ’s expertise spans managing complex actuarial workflows, conduct pricing studies, and optimizing reinsurance strategies for various types of clients. Prior to joining Guy Carpenter, he served as an Actuarial Manager at Ernst & Young, where he led actuarial reserve studies, and as a Pricing Analyst for a national insurer, specializing in Personal Auto and Homeowners lines.

  MJ holds a Bachelor of Business Administration in Actuarial Science and Risk Management from the University of Wisconsin-Madison. He is an Associate of the Casualty Actuarial Society (CAS) and a Member of the American Academy of Actuaries (AAA).

Moderator

• Andrew Li, FCAS - Andrew is currently the VP of Product Innovation at Corix Insurance, A Hiscox company. Andrew leads a cross-functional team charged developing specialty commercial insurance products to meet the needs of complex needs of businesses today and the future.

  Before joining Corix, Andrew was Head of Pricing at Corvus Insurance, an Industry-leading underwriter of Cyber Risk. At Corvus, Andrew leads collaborative teams of actuaries, data scientists, and technologists to solve the most dynamic line of business we have today! Focus areas include pricing, aggregation, capital management, and much more! Andrew joined Corvus as the first actuary because he was excited about working in the very unique intersection of technology and insurance.

3. Professionalism

Description – Coming soon

Learning Objectives – Coming soon

Speaker – Coming soon

4. Reflecting Social Inflation in Actuarial Methods

Description

In recent years, numerous articles have been published discussing the impact of social inflation on reserve levels and adverse development across various casualty lines. However, few have explored how actuaries could have identified these trends earlier and incorporated the adverse developments into their analyses. We aim to encourage actuaries to go beyond traditional actuarial methods by utilizing additional diagnostics that offer early warning signs, enabling them to adjust their methods to better account for adverse trends. These diagnostics and adjustments are informed by our work, experience, and the application of artificial intelligence to data sets.

We will also address the challenges actuaries face during periods of changing trends:
1) convincing management that the results are unfavorable, and
2) acknowledging that previous estimates were incorrect and need to be revised upward.

Learning Objectives

1. Reflect additional diagnostics to identify changes in trends earlier
2. Modify standard actuarial methods in response to changing trends
3. More effectively communicate unfavorable results to management

Speakers:

• Lori Julga, FCAS, MAAA – Lori is a Principal and Consulting Actuary with Milliman. Her work experience includes financial analysis, loss reserve analysis, and ratemaking. With over 30 years of consulting experience, Lori has had the opportunity to work with a variety of insurance companies. She has reviewed reserving processes for both large national and regional insurance companies and provided recommendations to improve efficiencies in regard to data warehouse, analytics team, methodologies and workflows. Lori also developed Milliman’s Industry Reserving Practice Survey and compiled results for benchmark timing, methods, business segmentation, key metrics and diagnostics.
• Brian Brown - Brian is a Principal and Consulting Actuary for Milliman, Inc. where his areas of expertise are property and casualty insurance, especially ratemaking, loss reserve analysis, and actuarial appraisals for mergers and acquisitions. Brian’s clients include many of the largest insurers/reinsurers in the world. Brian is a Past CAS President and was Milliman’s Global Casualty Practice Director.

5. The Economics of Social Inflation

Description

Social inflation has been spoken about by insurers at least since the mid 1970's as a catch-all description for claim inflation, either loosely caused by changes in societal attitudes, or with any cause but in excess of general consumer inflation. It has been hard, given that level of vagueness, to prove much about social inflation empirically, and impossible to make useful predictions like when it will speed up, or slow down, or which lines are most likely to be affected. What's needed is to root explanations of social inflation in a wider body of behavioral theory. We can describe economic models in which social inflation arises as a response to other economic changes.

Learning Objectives – Coming soon

Speakers:

• Justin N. Smith, FCAS, MAAA - Currently the Chief Economist of United Risk Group, Justin has over 30 years' experience in actuarial, finance, underwriting and economics roles in the Property & Casualty insurance industry and academia. He is a Fellow of the Casualty Actuarial Society and holds a PhD in Economics and Master's degrees from Oxford University.