Jae McKinney, CPO & Co-founder, Ramki Duriseti, CEO & Co-founder Cyber insurance is a relatively new concept for many. But as cyber risks continue to grow, more and more companies are insuring their assets against the potential damage of threats. The cyber insurance market is expected to reach $21.4 billion by 2025. There is virtually no solution available today that allows insurers to accurately assess policyholders' cyber risks, improve underwriting, customize policies, or even roll out additional services. On the other hand, insured organizations do not receive adequate cyber risk mitigation training. Companies must test their teams' abilities to respond to cyber threats to identify and remediate potential risks and build resilience. In short, minimizing cyber risk is in the best interest of everyone, including carriers, MGAs, underwriters, TPAs, benefits administrators, and cybersecurity teams.
This is where Infiniqo's innovative solution that leverages the power of gamification can be of great value.
Founded by Ramki Duriseti and Jamie (Jae) McKinney, Infiniqo offers Axon, as part of their new Molecules Platform. Axon is a gamified cyber risk assessment simulation solution that enables companies to examine and im- prove their cyber risk posture and preparedness. By simulating cyber-attacks, Infiniqo can tell how a company would react to specific incidents and where they stand regarding cyber risk preparedness and responsiveness. This enables cyber insurance companies and underwriters to better assess their clients' defensive positioning on cyber risk. They can also effectuate retentive training sessions—via stimulating cyber risk management, situational awareness, and decision intelligence—to minimize their policyholders' cyber risk.
Turning Game Players into Crisis Solvers
Axon delivers a complete 2D or VR video-game-style 3D rendering of real-world cyber-attacks and incidents generated via the Unity 3D & Unreal Engine cross-platform gaming engines. Each ‘incident' would play out like an interactive 2D, or 3D video game, complete with exercises and challenges that prompt teamwork and put employees to the test. The highly immersive, multi-player gaming simulation makes front-line employees into digital avatars or ‘players' who must work together and leverage their preparedness, intelligence, and speed to thwart or minimize the attack and ‘win' or successfully ‘not pay the ransom.'
Infiniqo collects employee photographs and situation requirements of the session beforehand to create complete 2D or 3D avatar models (on-screen characters) and live challenges.
Every 60 to 90 minutes gaming session begins with 10 to 15 players in a pre-created virtual situation room. Each player is assigned a real-life incidence response/risk mitigation role, and a Hollywood-style movie trailer is presented based on the setup of the characters and the situation. The game demands different thought responses from the players depending on the desired short-term and long-term outcomes. It prompts hypothetical questions, real-time stoppages, decision-making tips, discussions, and voting. The simulation will push players to get through the situation collaboratively using critical thinking techniques and resources they can leverage to neutralize the simulated attack. Based on how teams work together in solving a crisis, Infiniqo provides an assessment of the resourcefulness and performance showcased by the players and gives suggestions for improvement.
This ultimately translates to better real-world risk mitigation and management capabilities during an actual cyber-attack or incident. In parallel, insurers quantify existing risks, identify their clients' cybersecurity strengths/weaknesses, and create well-aligning policies while helping them come up with effective incidence response plans.
Stronger With Each Challenge—Experiential Learning for Better Outcomes
“In conferences across the UK, US, and Canada, Axon has generated great interest from insurance carriers, brokers, cyber attorneys, forensics personnel, and risk managers,” says Ramki Duriseti, CEO of Infiniqo.
"Our value proposition is the ability to manage organizational risk much better"
Insurers often call upon Infiniqo to assess the cyber risk of their clients. In one such instance, a large insurance broker wanted Infiniqo to ascertain the cyber risk profile of its primary policyholder a multinational financial institution located in Toronto. The company was also interested in creating a personalized cyber tabletop exercise for the financial institution. The person in charge of the task was the institution's risk manager, who worked closely with their CISO. He wanted Infiniqo to set up the exercise, which would be introduced and conducted by himself and the institution's designated cyber attorney. Infiniqo began its engagement by collecting headshots of all participants (employees). Next, the company created 2D character models for each team member and hired voiceover artists to bring them to life. As a final step, Infiniqo collaborated with the institution's risk manager and the cyber attorney to create a data breach scenario.
Infiniqo launched the virtual session, simulating an ultra- realistic rendering of a potential cyber-attack. Players were thrust into the virtual situation room and made to tackle the dynamic situation by collaborating and troubleshooting issues, sharpening their critical thinking and decision-making skills.
The risk manager and cyber attorney were astounded by several eye-opening moments during the virtual breach.
This ultimately translates to better real-world risk mitigation and management capabilities during an actual cyber-attack or incident. In parallel, insurers quantify existing risks, identify their clients' cybersecurity strengths/weaknesses, and create well-aligning policies while helping them come up with effective incidence response plans.
Stronger With Each Challenge—Experiential Learning for Better Outcomes
“In conferences across the UK, US, and Canada, Axon has generated great interest from insurance carriers, brokers, cyber attorneys, forensics personnel, and risk managers,” says Ramki Duriseti, CEO of Infiniqo.
"Our value proposition is the ability to manage organizational risk much better"
Insurers often call upon Infiniqo to assess the cyber risk of their clients. In one such instance, a large insurance broker wanted Infiniqo to ascertain the cyber risk profile of its primary policyholder a multinational financial institution located in Toronto. The company was also interested in creating a personalized cyber tabletop exercise for the financial institution. The person in charge of the task was the institution's risk manager, who worked closely with their CISO. He wanted Infiniqo to set up the exercise, which would be introduced and conducted by himself and the institution's designated cyber attorney. Infiniqo began its engagement by collecting headshots of all participants (employees). Next, the company created 2D character models for each team member and hired voiceover artists to bring them to life. As a final step, Infiniqo collaborated with the institution's risk manager and the cyber attorney to create a data breach scenario.
Infiniqo launched the virtual session, simulating an ultra- realistic rendering of a potential cyber-attack. Players were thrust into the virtual situation room and made to tackle the dynamic situation by collaborating and troubleshooting issues, sharpening their critical thinking and decision-making skills.
The risk manager and cyber attorney were astounded by several eye-opening moments during the virtual breach.
They saw a copy of themselves and what the situation could be in reality. The session gave them a real immersive tabletop experience instead of the traditional paper-based exercises that they practiced in the past. After the session, Infiniqo prepared assessments for the PR, legal, communications, and IT teams, highlighting their cybersecurity weaknesses and methods for improving their security posture.
Diversifying Axon’s Value Proposition
Infiniqo breaks down the risk management process for companies into four phases. Building a company's “awareness” of cyber risks is the first step. The following “exercise” phase helps establish practical preparedness in every person. It enables the organization to visualize how they can respond to the attack in the least disruptive way. This leads to improved “responsiveness” in cyber management, incident management, business interruptions, or any other situation. Lastly, organizations learn to quickly and cost-effectively “recover” from any adverse situation. Infiniqo wants clients to promote their employees from players to crisis managers by leveraging its solution. Jae McKinney, CPO of Infiniqo, emphasizes, “Our value proposition can manage any organization's risk much better.” Interestingly enough, this capability came from Infiniqo's origins as a neurosurgery simulation solution that Ramki and McKinney later repurposed for the cyber insurance/risk management market.
Diversifying Axon’s Value Proposition
Infiniqo breaks down the risk management process for companies into four phases. Building a company's “awareness” of cyber risks is the first step. The following “exercise” phase helps establish practical preparedness in every person. It enables the organization to visualize how they can respond to the attack in the least disruptive way. This leads to improved “responsiveness” in cyber management, incident management, business interruptions, or any other situation. Lastly, organizations learn to quickly and cost-effectively “recover” from any adverse situation. Infiniqo wants clients to promote their employees from players to crisis managers by leveraging its solution. Jae McKinney, CPO of Infiniqo, emphasizes, “Our value proposition can manage any organization's risk much better.” Interestingly enough, this capability came from Infiniqo's origins as a neurosurgery simulation solution that Ramki and McKinney later repurposed for the cyber insurance/risk management market.
Infiniqo is constantly expanding the platform's capabilities to facilitate better risk management. As a result, various industries with different risks and decision-making procedures will soon be able to create situation rooms that meet their needs. The company is also developing a new SaaS platform that can simulate physical situations such as natural disasters, kidnappings, active shooters, armed intruders, and civil unrest events. For this, Infiniqo pays keen attention to the creative content that goes into the platform. Their long-term vision is to make the situation rooms more immersive and Metaverse ready. “It's important to note that Unity 3D is Facebook's platform to build out their Meta offerings. And this is what we have been working on since late 2017. That gives us a natural entry into this space,” says McKinney.
Axon delivers a complete 2D or VR video-game-style 3D rendering of real-world cyber-attacks and incidents generated via the Unity 3D and Unreal Engine crossplatform game engine
Company
Infiniqo
Headquarters
Princeton, NJ
Management
Jae McKinney, CPO & Co-founder, Ramki Duriseti, CEO & Co-founder
Description
Infiniqo is an insurance technology startup offering 2D/3D simulated cyber risk management products that deliver highly empowering and immersive user interactions
