Cyber Essentials for Cyber Insurance
Getting cover — and keeping the premium sensible — increasingly starts with Cyber Essentials. Insurers ask for it, reward it, and certified organisations are far less likely to claim in the first place.
Why insurers care about Cyber Essentials
Cyber insurance has hardened: insurers want evidence of basic hygiene before they'll quote, and they price around it. Cyber Essentials maps neatly onto what the proposal form asks — MFA, patching, backups, access control — so a current certificate answers much of it in one line and signals you're a lower risk.
- It's increasingly required. A growing number of insurers ask for Cyber Essentials to offer cover at all, and some require the audited CE Plus for higher limits.
- It affects the premium. Certification is a recognised risk signal; government figures indicate certified organisations are markedly less likely to make a claim, which insurers reflect at renewal.
- It speeds up the proposal. The proposal form's security questions largely mirror the Cyber Essentials controls, so certifying gets you most of the answers.
Cover comes included, too
Eligible UK organisations (turnover under £20m) that certify their whole organisation get IASME's cyber-liability insurance included with Cyber Essentials at no extra cost — a useful baseline while you arrange or renew your main policy.
Where testing fits
Some insurers, or higher levels of cover, also want evidence of penetration testing. If that's on your proposal form, our penetration testing for cyber insurance pairs naturally with certification — we scope both to what your insurer actually asks for.
Ready to buy?
Transparent, fixed pricing based on your organisation size. By default we give you access to the IASME portal to complete your Cyber Essentials assessment yourself, and once you submit it we aim to assess within one business day. You can preview the Cyber Essentials self-assessment questions to see where you stand first. There is no call or consultation as standard; we simply send you the questionnaire to complete. Your submission is reviewed by a qualified, certified assessor, never fed into AI. Need it faster? Add urgent turnaround below. Want us to review your setup against the controls before you apply? That is a gap analysis, quoted separately: ask for one using the contact button under the form.
An appointed IASME Certification Body: your certificate comes directly from us. Verify our credentials on the BlockMark registry, and find us listed on the IASME website.
Common questions
Do insurers require Cyber Essentials?
More and more do — some won't quote without it, and some require the audited CE Plus for higher limits. Even where it's optional, it typically improves your terms.
Will Cyber Essentials lower my premium?
It's a recognised risk signal and government data shows certified organisations are far less likely to claim, which insurers reflect at renewal. It's not a guarantee of a discount, but it strengthens your position.
Does Cyber Essentials come with insurance?
Eligible UK organisations with turnover under £20m that certify their whole organisation get IASME's cyber-liability insurance included at no extra cost. It's a baseline, not a substitute for a full policy.
My insurer also wants a penetration test — can you do both?
Yes. We're an IASME assessor and a CREST tester, so we can scope Cyber Essentials and a penetration test together to match exactly what your insurer's proposal form asks for.
Related
Free, no obligation
Understand your exposure
An attacker’s first move is not an attack, it is a look. So we look first, and send you what we find, worst first.
- Services and ports you did not know were open
- Security misconfigurations on anything public facing
- Known vulnerabilities already indexed by engines like Shodan
- Company credentials sitting in known breach data
The only question is: do you know where and how to look?
We reply within one business day. Prefer to talk first? 01902 288763 or info@solusec.co.uk.
Nothing is touched on your systems. It is all public and already indexed, just scattered. We pull it together, which is what an attacker does first.
Get certified for your insurer
Tell us what your proposal form or renewal asks for. We'll get you certified — and test too, if that's on the form.