“Insurance versus digital harm: a content analysis of home and cyber insurance policies in the USA and UK”
Introduction
The research article “Insurance versus digital harm: a content analysis of home and cyber insurance policies in the USA and UK” by Jain, Hrle and Woods, investigates how well home and cyber insurance policies protect individuals from digital harms such as hacking, ransomware, cyber-attacks and data breaches. This review aims to examine how this article relates to the principles of social science, assess the research methods used, its data and analysis, the research’s challenges, concerns and contributions to marginalized groups and to the public. This article, published in the Journal of Cybersecurity in 2025, provides a unique insight to the growing world of digital technology and the issues we currently face.
Principles of Social Science
The social science principles relating to this article include empiricism, skepticism, and objectivity. The researchers collected empirical data of fifty insurance companies across two countries and evaluated them based on coverage and pricings to understand the benefits they provide to consumers. Skepticism was reflected in the way an ambiguous category of ‘silent cyber’ had to be introduced within the results questioning whether the insurance policies sufficiently address the digital harms. The research made use of a content analysis to avoid any subjective or biased interpretations to form a completely objective analysis of the insurance policies, their coverages and pricings.
Research Questions and Hypothesis
The research questions stated in this article are ‘RQ1 How does home insurance cover digital harm?’, RQ2 What is covered by consumer cyber insurance?’, and ‘RQ3 How is consumer cyber insurance priced?’ (Jain et al., 2025). These questions aim to investigate how home and cyber insurance covers digital harm for individuals and how it is priced across fifty insurance policies between the US and UK.
Methods of Research
Content analysis, a qualitative type of research was used in this article to examine the fifty different insurance policies and identify coverage terms, exclusions, and pricing structures. Afterwards the use of “inductive in vivo coding” was done for theme-based classifications (Jain et al., 2025). To ensure validation, a second coder analysis was conducted using a quantitative approach. This tactic paired with pricing data analysis, falls under archival and multimethod research. Archival research is evident in how the researchers gathered their data by exploring insurance policies and multimethod research with the use of both quantitative and qualitative methods.
Data and Analysis
Through its research methods, the study collected data on 26 home insurance policies with 11 from the US and 18 from the UK and 24 cyber insurance policies, 21 from the US and 3 from the UK (Jain et al., 2025). Pricing data from the SERFF database was used to separate prices into premium ranges, deductibles, policy limits and actuarial risk calculations. The analysis found UK home insurers lacked explicit statements of digital harms and US home insurers were ‘silent’, or neither including nor excluding certain digital harms from their policies. Cyber insurance companies were found to be the most consistent with the range of coverages as well as the prices.
Relation to Cybersecurity & Social Science Concepts
Mitigation, a research concept in social cybersecurity, focuses on lessening the impact of cyber offenses or becoming more resilient to digital harm. The article questions whether there is a role that cyber insurance plays in mitigation, going beyond cyber incidents (Jain et al., 2025). Insurance is a part of the economy and cybersecurity issues and solutions provides a way of goods and services for insurance companies to make a profit, this aligns with the principles of supply and demand. With collaboration and teamwork from both social scientists and cybersecurity professionals, insurance companies will be able to reevaluate their policies and learn about the extent of different types of digital harm to provide better coverage for consumers. Consumer cyber insurance was described as “human-centered” because of its focus mental health counselling, cyberbullying and identity theft, this falls in line with human factors cybersecurity where the focus is on the individual (Jain et al., 2025).
Challenges and Contributions
The challenges described in this article includes the lack of options for low-income individuals to protect themselves from any digital vulnerabilities or any financial losses that come as a result. Another challenge that came up in the research was the higher cost of insurance policies to victims of domestic violence or teens who are victims of cyberbullying. These communities are all prone to digital harm, while some cyber insurance policies do cover counselling and relocation costs, it is often expensive.
Contributions of this study includes the exposure of the silence of US policies versus the exclusion of UK policies when it comes to digital harms like cyberattacks (Jain et al., 2025). This research also highlights the importance of cyber insurance policies and their extensive digital harm coverage. This study provides awareness of the protections that are in place for those who need it and the ones that provide the most benefits.
Conclusion
To conclude, this research article highlights significant gaps in cyber insurance coverages, exposing how home insurers either exclude or inadequately address digital harms, while cyber insurers provide more transparent and inclusive policies. These findings suggest that both home and cyber insurers need to improve their policies by offering more affordable plans and clearer coverage for various digital harms. Integrating social science concepts and expertise can help guide these improvements, benefiting both insurers and consumers.
Reference
Jain, R., Hrle, T., & Woods, D. W. (2025). Insurance versus Digital Harm: A content analysis of home and Cyber Insurance Policies in the USA and UK. Journal of Cybersecurity, 11(1). https://doi.org/10.1093/cybsec/tyae031