Debbie Blanco helped us with our small business insurance needs in a such a pleasant manner, I don't know why I put if off for so long. She was quick, reliable and precise. It was all very easy.
Cyber insurance for small business.
Quick answerWhat can cyber insurance cover for a small business, and what should I check before buying it?Cyber insurance can help a small business pay for incident response, data restoration and lost income after a data breach. Cover for a fake invoice payment is not automatic. Consolidated Insurance Brokers checks the sections and limits against the money, data and systems your business relies on. Ring 07 3292 1111.
A fake invoice can cost you money. An attack can stop you working. We help you choose cyber cover around how your business runs, with a clear explanation of the losses it can cover versus those you may have to pay yourself.
Google reviews, word for word
1 of 21
We had excellent service in obtaining insurance on a newly purchased commercial property. Clayton Rowlings explained everything so clearly and very patient with many questions regarding different options. Highly recommended! Thanks Clayton.
Tracey helped me sort out professional indemnity and public liability insurance for my new business - she was super helpful throughout the process helping me navigate for the first time.
Deja provided a prompt and professional service in securing a policy that suited my requirements.
Terrific experience with Gina. I had a difficult policy which other brokers couldn't find a solution for. Gina had an option for me within a few hours. I would highly recommend.
Thank you so much Cyndie for your help/advice/service. You made the whole process so easy. Thank you again. Jason Armstrong
Alison was a life-saver for us, staying after hours to make sure that we could get the building insurance coverage we urgently needed for a property purchase.
Debbie was always happy to help with my questions and very prompt with her service.
Hi I can highly recommend Aimee Spencer for all your insurance needs she has done a fantastic effort on keeping my insurance policy once again Many Thanks for all your work
Saskia Van Oostveen was efficient, professional, accurate, helpful and friendly throughout the entire process. Highly recommend!
A great experience with Tori, attaining some tricky commercial insurance, she was very professional in catering to your needs, whilst also having a quick turn around.
Jade was wonderful, finding me insurance coverage for a commercial property. Greatly appreciated her excellent service.
I contacted Tracey E from Consolidated Insurance Brokers for some commercial property quotes. Tracey was super helpful helpful, friendly and provided great advice. Highly recommend for all your insurance needs!
Thanks for your assistance Dylan with car insurance inquiry you have been really helpful and professional.
Shona was always available and answered all my queriers. A1 service and happy to recommend.
I contacted Renay after she was recommended by a family friend, for home and contents insurance. She was prompt and helpful and had me all sorted in a couple of days. Highly recommend!
I needed fast transit insurance this week and Daniel Roussounis was outstanding in his immediate response and getting this organized for me. Can't recommend Daniel and Consolidated Insurance Brokers highly enough!
Second year organising insurance with Jim K., did not have any issues and a smooth transition. I recommend
May Lewong at the Emerald office was amazing. Easy to deal with and was quick and efficient.
Reena was absolutely fantastic during the entire process helping me set you our new home and contents insurance. Would definitely recommend to anyone.
Natasha as always, gives us professional, exceptional service and would recommend her to any business :-)
Read every review, word for word as it was written on Google
Written by William Paull, QPIB
Co-Founder & Account Director · Read William’s full profile
You don't need to be a target. You just need an inbox. Most small businesses are not picked out one by one. They are caught by scams sent at scale.
What does a cyber policy pay for?
What your schedule lists, up to the limit on each section. The schedule is the pages that set out your own cover.
- Money lost to a scam such as a fake invoice or a redirected payment.
- IT forensic work to find out what happened and close the gap.
- Recovering your data and getting your systems and website working again.
- Income lost while your systems are down.
- Responding to ransomware that locks your files, or another extortion demand.
- Notifying customers whose details were exposed, and credit monitoring where the breach needs it.
- A customer or client who claims because their information was exposed on your systems.
- The cost of a regulator's investigation after a breach is reported, where the policy includes it.
Policies differ on how many hours your systems must be down before lost income is paid, and on how long it is paid for.
If you pay a fake invoice, will cyber insurance cover it?
Only if your policy has a scam-payment section, and that section typically has a limit of its own.
The common shape: someone gets into a supplier's email, watches how its invoices are worded, then sends you one that looks identical, with new bank details.
Of the cyber policies we offer, some build scam-payment cover in. On others it is an optional section, or one that can be left off, and some leave it out altogether. So the section has to show on your schedule.
The scam-payment limit is commonly between $25,000 and $250,000, depending on the insurer and the exact fraud type, and it is confirmed in your quote. Buying a bigger cyber limit usually does not lift it. Where the section is optional, it is chosen at quote.
On some of the cyber policies we place, a redirected-payment claim is not paid if nobody in your business made an independent check before the money went out. That means checking that the request to change the bank account, or the payment instructions, were genuine. Most of those that include scam-payment cover do not ask for that. Yours might, so check any change of bank details independently before you pay.
What does cyber insurance cost?
From $915 a year for $500,000 of cover. That was the lowest on our book in October 2026 (a Queensland consultant, $2,500 excess), including GST, stamp duty and fees.
For $1 million of cover, the lowest that month was $1,160 (a Queensland psychologist, $2,500 excess). The excess is the part of each claim you pay yourself. The small and medium businesses we insure for cyber mostly settle on $500,000 to $1 million of cover. They get there by weighing the premium against the risk. Our guide to how much cyber insurance costs explains what moves the price.
What if you can't answer the IT questions on the application?
Where your business is eligible, we go first to insurers that do not ask the technical IT questions.
A wrong answer on the form can let the insurer challenge or reduce a claim, even when you never meant to get it wrong. With some of the insurers we use, that reduction can reach a part of the loss the wrong answer had nothing to do with.
Faced with IT jargon, you assume your IT provider is doing the backups. You assume the authenticator app on your phone means multi-factor authentication (the second check, a code or an app, when someone logs in) is on everywhere. Often neither is true.
You still answer questions about the business itself and whether it qualifies. Where an insurer does ask the IT questions, we help you answer them from what you know. Where you are unsure, we check the point with the insurer, or you give the more cautious answer. On the covers we place, answering every security question at its most cautious can still bring back a quote with no cover removed and no conditions added, only a different price.
Even where an insurer does not ask about your systems, you still have to tell them anything you know that would matter to their decision.
Is the cyber cover in another policy enough?
Not on its own. Cyber added to a management liability policy is usually capped at about $250,000, so we normally place cyber as a policy of its own.
If you hold management liability insurance with a cyber extension, check whether that limit would cover a real incident in your business. Do the same with any cyber section in your business pack.
Your IT provider's insurance is written to protect the IT provider. If your website host, cloud provider or IT contractor is breached, your customers' details can go with it. Telling those customers and answering the regulator still fall to you.
If you ever have to claim, who do you ring first?
Check this before you buy: for a scam payment it is your bank, then the insurer's helpline; some policies make that helpline your first call for everything else.
Some cyber policies set conditions on who you contact first. If money ever goes to a scammer, your bank would be the first call, to stop or recover the transfer. Straight after, you would ring the insurer's cyber incident helpline, on the number in your policy documents, and then us on 07 3292 1100.
On some of the covers we arrange, the costs of the response and of telling customers are paid only if the insurer agreed first. On those covers, the insurer also picks who runs the response. Calling in your own IT contractor first, without asking, can put part of the cover at risk. Telling customers before you have told the insurer can leave you paying for a notice the policy would have covered. We go through those conditions with you before you buy.
When you claim on a cyber policy
On a policy we look after, a specialist claims manager on our team manages the claim with the insurer, and your broker stays on it.
After those first calls, the claims manager deals with the insurer for you and pushes back where the policy and the evidence support a different answer. The broker who looks after your policy stays involved and keeps an eye on where the claim stands, so you spend less time chasing it while you get the business running again. You still give it the records it asks for. The insurer makes the decision, and we explain what is happening.
Short answers
We don't hold sensitive customer information. Do we still need cyber insurance?
Personal information is wider than "sensitive" sounds: anything about a person who is identified or could reasonably be identified, such as a name, an email address, a phone number or an order history. Almost every business Consolidated Insurance Brokers insures holds that somewhere. Contracts with bigger clients can also require cyber cover as a condition of the work.
Can you check the cyber cover I already have?
Yes. Consolidated Insurance Brokers goes through the cover you hold and tells you what it would and would not pay. If the policy suits you, we can look after it for the rest of its term without cancelling it.
Does cyber insurance cover an employee stealing money from the business?
Generally not under the cyber crime sections. On the wordings we use, those sections are written for money taken by someone outside your business, not by your own employees or contractors. Theft by your own people is a fidelity or crime cover, which is a different policy. An insider who causes a data breach can still bring in the rest of a cyber policy.
Will my cyber insurance claim be declined if I don't have multi-factor authentication?
On the policies we place, it turns mostly on what your application said. A yes to multi-factor authentication when it was not on everywhere may let the insurer treat that answer as wrong and challenge the claim. An honest "not everywhere yet" protects the claim better than a hopeful yes.
Does cyber insurance cover ransomware?
Most cyber policies on our book respond in some way: the specialist response, recovering your data, and the trading you lose while you are offline. Some name the ransom payment itself as covered, where it is legal to pay and the insurer has agreed first. Others pay the costs of responding without naming the ransom.
Do accountants and bookkeepers need cyber insurance?
A practice holds years of client financial records and sits inside the email threads where money moves, so yes. Scammers impersonate accountants because clients act on a payment instruction from their accountant.
Does a tradie need cyber insurance?
If you invoice by email and take bank transfers, yes. The loss to watch is a payment going to the wrong account. A swapped account number on a progress claim can mean you pay a supplier's fake invoice, or your customer pays someone posing as you. A modest policy with the scam-payment section in place can respond to that loss.
Do allied health providers need cyber insurance?
A physio, dental, podiatry or psychology practice holds health information, which the privacy law treats as sensitive. However small the practice, it must follow the mandatory data-breach rules, so yes. A cyber policy can pay for telling patients and dealing with the regulator.
I sell IT services. Will a small-business cyber policy cover my clients' claims?
Often not. If a client claims because IT work you provide, maintain or manage for them for a fee has failed, a small-business cyber policy we arrange can exclude that claim. Those claims sit in technology insurance, where one policy can hold professional indemnity, public liability and cyber.
Find out what your cyber cover pays, or what it should.
No policy yet, a renewal you don't follow, or a broker who has gone quiet? Ring 07 3292 1111 and talk it through with a broker. We look at how your business takes money and holds data, then explain which sections you need.