CFC estimates US small-business cyber take-up at 30-40%, against 10-15% in comparable markets

Specialist insurer CFC estimates that between 30% and 40% of small and medium-sized enterprises (SMEs) in the US hold cyber insurance, compared with roughly 10% to 15% in comparable markets including the UK, Canada, Australia and New Zealand. Lindsey Maher, CFC's head of global cyber development, gave the estimate to Insurance Business, which published it on 16 October 2026. The figures are an industry estimate, not the result of a survey.

Maher put the US lead down to market structure, not culture. More carriers have sold cyber cover to American small firms, and for longer; she counted "over 200 cyber markets" offering the product there. In her view the reasons small firms elsewhere do not buy are largely the same from one country to the next.

The first, she said, lies with insurers: small firms are still asked to complete question sets written for large corporates, and she called 20-page forms "not realistic" for that segment. Carriers are moving towards simpler digital applications. Many generalist brokers also see cyber as complex or outside their remit, and the cover is often raised only at the end of a renewal, where it is easy to put off while prices are soft.

National surveys give a rough local picture, but they cover different business populations and define cover differently, so they do not support a direct cross-country comparison. A survey for the Insurance Bureau of Canada, run in August 2025 among 308 owners and decision makers at firms with up to 500 staff and published on 1 October 2025, found that 22% had some cyber cover and 12% a standalone policy. The UK government's Cyber Security Breaches Survey 2025/2026, published on 30 April 2026 and covering 2,112 businesses, found 47% insured against cyber risk in some form, which can include cover bundled into a wider policy; the two previous editions found 45% and 43%.