Sydney-based Tide Foundation has partnered with Lloyd’s-backed underwriter Becco to insure companies adopting its “guaranteed cybersecurity” system.

Tide says clients using its TideCloak technology have security so strong they “can dispense with the majority of burdensome compliance paperwork, practices and audits”.

The system eliminates centralised authority in access control and offers “architecturally unbypassable” protection.

The insurtech likens its technology to “keys that you can’t steal, lose or misuse ... a new way to future-proof your platform against cyber breaches with mathematical certainty”.

Co-founder Yuval Hertzog says the cybersecurity industry “has been fighting the wrong battle”.

“Every major breach points to the same weakness: centralized authority,” he said.

“TideCloak locks away that authority itself beyond anyone’s reach. Nobody, not even administrators, insiders or even Tide, can compromise the system.”  

Tide’s “ineffable cryptography” uses virtual keys that are generated and operated in secrecy across a decentralised network of servers operated by independent organisations – none of which hold the whole key or know what it unlocks. This creates “cyber herd immunity”, it says.

Mr Hertzog says it is “as if a driver can tap into preferential insurance for choosing a car that physically cannot run off the road because the roads are magnetically guided. The insurer isn’t betting on your driving skills; it’s betting on iron-clad physics.”

Becco is an appointed representative of Movo Partnership, which was part of AUB’s acquisition of 80% of UK broking business Movo Group late last year.

Founder Geoff Stooke says traditional cyber insurance treats all digital infrastructure equally, leading to a misalignment of premiums and coverage.

“By underwriting cryptographically hardened systems, we’re insuring a fundamentally different class of risk. This partnership makes the benefits accessible to mainstream businesses for the first time,” he said.