Aon joins EU Horizon 2020 initiative to tackle cyber risk

Aon has joined WISER, a project part of the EU’s flagship innovation and research programme Horizon 2020. The WISER project aims to improve the cyber security practices at firms through an easy to use framework to assess cyber-crime, implement best practice and report serious compromises. Aon will help further the practical side of the programme by providing a platform for business.

Horizon 2020 is the European Union’s largest programme to foster Research and Innovation. Potential breakthroughs, discoveries and world firsts are provided access to a funding pool of €80 billion made available over 7 years – as well as access to the private investment attracted by the public money. The project aims to improve Europe’s global competitiveness.

WISER
Among the initiatives to be funded is finding ways of protecting businesses from cybercrime, by putting cyber-risk management at the core of good business practice. One project with this aim is the WISER (Wide Impact Cyber Security Risk Framework) project, which aims to create a framework in which cyber risks are assessed, monitored and mitigated.

The partnership between Aon and WISER will see the consulting firm help deliver on WISER’s aim of providing a framework on which infrastructure and complex systems can be assessed for vulnerabilities. The analytics tool developed in the project is set to be user-friendly, providing managers and risk managers in understanding such complex systems. The system will allow both public and private users to understand and quantify the consequences of cyber-crime activity on their networks. The project further aims to provide compromised organisations with an easy framework to comply with EU laws on disclosing and reporting on serious breaches.

Commenting on the partnership, Giorgio Aprile, Director Financial Industry Advisory Services at Aon, says: “Aon’s involvement in this WISER project will drive practical business outcomes such as a real time IT assessment platform and a cyber-risk exposure model for non-traditional aspects of cyber risk.”

Bill Peck, Chief Commercial Officer at Aon Risk Solutions, EMEA, adds: “It is a great privilege to be the only financial services organisation partnering on the WISER cyber resilience project. Growing business concern about cyber risk was recently highlighted in Aon’s Global Risk Management Survey. Working under a European Commission initiative will ensure that business, government and legislators’ priorities are aligned to commercial needs across the EU, as this emerging risk continues to develop.”