Most startups that have “cybersecurity” in their elevator pitch focus on breach prevention or remediating incidents after the fact. At-Bay Inc. instead sells insurance.

The startup, which exited stealth mode today, is the latest in a crop of emerging players seeking to shake up the historically slow-moving insurance industry. Data from Crunchbase shows that such new-generation providers have raised over $700 million from investors in the first half of 2017 alone. But whereas most of them offer policies aimed at consumers, At-Bay is targeting companies that look to reduce the financial impact of data breaches.

Demand for so-called cyberinsurance is growing rapidly as large-scale attacks become increasingly common. Shipping giant AP Moller-Maersk AS, for instance, recently released an estimate saying that an internal breach from earlier this year may incur losses of up to $300 million.

At-Bay said it approaches the risk posed by such attacks much differently than traditional insurers. The startup uses risk models to analyze organizations’ security operations and understand where they stand. After creating an initial profile, At-Bay continuously refreshes the data in a way that accounts for the rapidly changing nature of the threat landscape.

The startup said this approach can provide a better view of future risks than the traditional modeling methods used by insurers, which are often more historical in nature. Higher accuracy, in turn, means that organizations are charged at rates that more precisely reflect their security postures.

At-Bay also uses the data produced by its algorithms to help companies identify ways of improving their cyberdefenses and further lower insurance costs. The startup makes security information available alongside financial breakdowns designed to quantify the business impact, as well as various related resources.

At-Bay’s policies are backed by a subsidiary of insurance giant Munich Re AG. The startup has also raised $6 million in seed funding from LightSpeed Venture Partners, LocalGlobe and Check Point Software Technologies Ltd. co-founder Shlomo Kramer.

Image: TheDigitalArtist/Pixabay