Cyber Controls That Strengthen Manufacturing Risk
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Article Summary
Insurers are taking a closer look at the controls manufacturers have in place across IT and OT environments. Coverage, pricing, and underwriting expectations often vary by revenue, with larger organizations facing stricter requirements. Even when not required, stronger security measures can improve both resilience and how a manufacturer is viewed by insurers.
For manufacturers, cyber insurance has become an increasingly important part of the broader risk conversation. But not every organization is evaluated the same way, and assumptions about coverage can lead to costly surprises. Understanding how insurers view manufacturing risk is becoming just as important as understanding the threats themselves.
Cyber insurance is priced and underwritten based on a combination of factors: industry, revenue size, employee count, and increasingly, the sophistication of your IT and OT security controls. For manufacturers, knowing where you fall into the underwriting framework is critical to both securing coverage and managing premium costs.
Revenue Band Breakdown
| Revenue Band | Underwriting Profile | Key Control Requirements |
| $0 – $25M | Getting Started Tier (Most Flexibility) | Foundational controls encouraged. Fewer mandatory requirements (but don’t mistake flexibility for immunity). Small manufacturers made up roughly half of all businesses attacked in 2025. |
| $25M – $150M | Baseline Controls Required |
Multi-Factor Authentication (MFA) for remote access, admin, and email
Email Security Controls: screening, filtering, isolation/quarantine
Endpoint Protection (EPP) + Endpoint Detection & Response (EDR) on 95%+ of endpoints |
| $150M+ | Comprehensive Program Required (Most Stringent) |
All lower-tier controls, PLUS:
Tested BC/DR Plans
Annual vulnerability scanning & penetration testing
MFA-protected, encrypted, multi-location backups
Offline/immutable backups for larger risks |
Cybersecurity Controls That Strengthen Insurability
The controls below aren’t always required, but they matter for both your security posture and how carriers perceive your risk profile. You don’t need all of them, but if a control genuinely adds value to your internal IT team’s ability to detect and respond to threats, it will add value to your insurance marketplace too.
- Security Operations Center (SOC): 24/7 monitoring of your environment
- Managed Detection & Response (MDR) / Network Detection & Response (NDR): external experts actively hunting threats
- Security Information and Event Management (SIEM): centralized logging and correlation of security events
- Application Isolation and Containment: limits the damage a compromised application can cause
You may not have every control in place yet, but you still need a clear view of where you stand and where gaps exist. As insurers look more closely at both IT and OT exposure, the underwriting conversation is becoming less about checking a box and more about showing that risk is being actively managed.