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Professional Indemnity Australia Weekly Risk and Insurance News

Each week, Professional Indemnity Australia brings a clear, plain-English wrap of the news affecting professionals and small businesses across the country. We cover industry developments, regulatory updates, notable cases, and emerging risk trends—distilling what changed, why it matters, and practical takeaways you can act on. Expect concise, trustworthy coverage tailored to consultants, contractors, and SMEs, helping you stay informed, compliant, and confident without the noise.

This Week:

This weeks wrap covers four developments for Australian professionals and SMEs. Updated financial lines wordings clarify professional indemnity, D&O, DDO and privacy/cyber clauses for financial services firms. ASD reports financial and insurance services are the most frequently targeted non‑government sector for cyber incidents, reinforcing the need to pair PI with cyber cover. After the first Privacy Act civil penalty, businesses are urged to confirm if fines and penalties are insurable under their policies. APRA data shows advised life insurance disputes have risen, a reminder for advice firms to tighten processes and ensure PI limits and retro dates are adequate.

EPISODE 802 | Professional Indemnity Australia Weekly Risk and Insurance News | Sun, 19th Oct 2025

25 Oct 2025 | Paige Estritori

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Read Full Transcript:

Hello and welcome to Professional Indemnity Australia Weekly Risk and Insurance News, Im Paige Estritori, and its Saturday 18 October 2025. First up, changes to financial lines cover. A major insurer has refreshed policy wordings for Australian financial institutions to reflect recent laws. The updates include clearer professional indemnity and directors and officers sections, an extension for design and distribution obligations, more explicit privacy and cyber clauses, and help with product remediation costs. If you hold an Australian Financial Services Licence, or advise funds, its a good time to review your schedule and wording with a broker to ensure your professional indemnity cover still matches your services and compliance duties. Next up, cyber risk keeps climbing. The Australian Signals Directorate, or ASD, says financial and insurance services reported the largest share of cyber incidents last year, with more than eighty‑four thousand cybercrimes across the economy. Credential theft and denial‑of‑service attacks feature heavily. For consultants and SMEs, that means stronger access controls and incident plans, plus checking that your professional indemnity policy responds to claims after a privacy breach, and considering a separate cyber policy for business interruption and response costs. Meanwhile, enforcement is biting. Following Australias first civil penalty for a data breach under the Privacy Act, risk advisers are urging businesses to check whether fines and penalties are covered, and in what circumstances. Maximum penalties can be very large, and many wordings limit or exclude them depending on the law. The practical move is simple: ask your broker to confirm what is and isnt covered for regulatory investigations, penalties where insurable by law, and related legal defence costs, so you can align PI, cyber and management liability without gaps. Finally, a pulse check on complaints. New data from the Australian Prudential Regulation Authority, or APRA, shows advised life insurance disputes rose in the first half of the year, with many decisions later changed or resolved. For advice businesses, higher dispute activity tends to flow through to professional indemnity exposure. Tighten files and statements of advice, keep contemporaneous notes, and make sure your retroactive date and limits reflect todays claim patterns. Thats it for this week. If youd like help tailoring professional indemnity cover for your business, head to professional-indemnity-australia.com.au and get your free quote today. Im Paige Estritori—thanks for listening, and speak to you next week.

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