Personal Cyber Insurance for Your Household

The claim we see most is wire fraud. Someone gets an email that looks like it's from their escrow officer, contractor, or bank, they send the money, and it's gone. Banks usually won't cover it. NetGuard® SELECT from Tokio Marine HCC is personal cyber insurance, and it covers those stolen funds up to your full limit, even if it was your assistant who sent the wire. It also covers ransomware, identity theft, data recovery, and help for your kids if they're bullied online, and it comes with identity monitoring. Our pricing is $700 a year for $250,000 of coverage, $1,765 for $500,000, or $2,650 for $1,000,000, including fees and taxes and subject to underwriting. The application is short, and coverage generally starts 7 days after we share your application with the carrier.

How wire fraud usually happens

A few examples of what could happen:

Closing on a home. You are waiting to close and get an email from your real estate agent with wiring instructions. The agent's email account was hacked. You wire the down payment to the criminal.

Contractor invoices. A contractor working on your house emails a weekly invoice, and your assistant pays it. After a few weeks the real contractor calls to ask why he hasn't been paid. Someone had taken over the email chain and changed where the money went.

A call or text from "your bank." Someone calls or texts pretending to be your bank. They get your password, or they talk you into moving money.

What the policy does

If you lose money to a scam like these and you can't get it back from your bank or credit card company, the policy covers the loss. The cyber crime coverage is the same as your full policy limit: $250,000, $500,000, or $1,000,000. It also applies if someone working for you, such as an assistant or bookkeeper, sent the payment. A $1,000 deductible applies to each claim.

Tokio Marine HCC's claims team is available 24/7 at 888.627.8995 or CyberClaims@tmhcc.com.

Other coverage in the policy

Ransomware and extortion. If someone locks your computer or files and demands payment, the policy pays the ransom and the cost of an IT expert to help.

Identity theft. Pays for credit reports, credit monitoring, and an attorney to help restore your identity and credit. You also get access to IDX identity monitoring once the policy is issued.

Data recovery. Pays to replace, recreate, or restore data on a computer or device in your home that is damaged or stolen.

Cyberbullying. If someone in your household is bullied online, it pays for therapy, temporary relocation, childcare or caregiver costs, and an IT expert to remove the content. If a child can't go to school, it can also pay for tutoring or a move to another school.

Privacy liability. If you hold other people's personal information, for example as a nonprofit board member or a youth sports coach, and it gets exposed, the policy pays to notify them and give them credit monitoring. It also covers your defense if they sue.

Pricing

For business owners

This is personal coverage. It does not cover your company's systems, email, or business accounts, and it doesn't replace a commercial cyber policy.

We can write it on the executives and key people at your company as individuals. The company can pay the premium, but each person has their own policy. Call us and we'll go over limits, who should be covered, and billing.

How to apply

You answer 3 questions about prior claims, review the coverage description and application wording, then pick your limit and pay. We complete the application for you, and Tokio Marine HCC issues the policy and bills you directly. Coverage generally starts 7 days after we share your application with the carrier.

This is available to current Falcon West clients. If you're not a client yet, start here.

From the First Spam Email to a Locked Laptop

On May 3, 1978, Gary Thuerk, a marketer at Digital Equipment Corporation, sent what Guinness World Records calls the oldest electronic spam. About 397 ARPANET users got an all-caps invitation to see the new DECSYSTEM-20 in Los Angeles and San Mateo. People complained, since ARPANET was meant for official U.S. government use.

Playing off an old Monty Python skit the term “spam” was coined to describe its annoying, intrusive behavior.

That email was just a pushy product demo, but almost fifty years later, email is used for fake wire transfers, ransomware, and identity theft kits. In 2025, the FBI’s Internet Crime Complaint Center reported internet crime losses of over $21 billion with the actual amount of unreported losses believed to be much higher.

Homeowners insurance is still the right choice for fire, theft, or a broken pipe. But it is not meant to cover a locked computer, stolen wire transfer, or months of identity recovery. Here are three stories that show how things have changed since Thuerk’s email and the risks households face today.

The closing wire that was not from title

Matthew and Stefanie Brock were buying a home when cybercriminals pretended to be their title company. News in Florida described how a single letter was changed in the email address, the wiring instructions had no fraud warning, and over $38,000 was sent to the wrong account. Only about $5,000 was recovered. The rest was lost.

The FBI and Secret Service call this type of scam business email compromise. It is the same kind of fraud that targets companies, but here it was aimed at a couple right when they were expecting to send a large wire. The Brocks’ advice matches what title companies warn: do not trust wire instructions sent only by email. Call a known number and confirm the bank, routing, and account before sending money.

Homeowners insurance does not cover wire fraud just because the loss is painful. Personal cyber policies that include coverage for cyber crime or social engineering are meant for a different situation: when the bank will not reimburse you, is there insurance for that kind of fraud?

Extortion isn’t only a corporate word

On Falcon Forward, Mike Tanghe shared that Falcon West has seen companies lose millions to ransomware, denial-of-service, and phishing. These issues are usually discussed in business settings, but national data shows that households are affected too.

IC3 (the FBI’s Internet Crime Complaint Center) recorded 86,415 extortion complaints in 2024, a big increase from the year before. Extortion, phishing, and personal data breaches topped the report. On a personal device, extortion can mean family photos are locked, a demand note appears on a home laptop, or someone in the house is threatened. Major ransomware cases like Change Healthcare in 2024 make headlines, but household cases often go unnoticed until the computer locks up.

Personal cyber policies that cover cyber extortion directly are made for these situations. They help with ransom demands and provide IT support, depending on the policy. This is different from hoping a homeowners claim will cover it.

The breach you may not have clicked on

IC3 recorded over 64,000 personal data breach complaints in 2024, with losses of about $1.45 billion. Sometimes a phishing text starts it. Other times, it is a vendor, school, nonprofit, or coach’s spreadsheet. Recovering your identity takes time, and monitoring is not the same as fixing the problem. If you keep private information for others, like a board or team list, a leak could also mean someone else files a claim against you.

A personal cyber policy that covers identity recovery, and sometimes privacy liability for information you hold for others, is designed for these situations. Always read the policy details. Do not mistake a brochure for a guarantee of payment.

Don’t skip these things

This is not a suggestion to stop using backups, multi-factor authentication, or calling before sending a wire. Those steps are still important. Insurance is for the disaster that slips past your defenses.

Why Falcon West

Falcon West has insured families and businesses since 1981. In recent years we've seen clients lose large amounts to wire fraud, spend months fixing a stolen identity, and lose family photos to a locked computer. A homeowners policy usually doesn't cover any of that. We looked at the personal cyber policies available and chose NetGuard SELECT because it covers stolen funds up to the full limit.

Questions? Call us.

This page provides a general product summary and should not be construed as a guarantee of coverage. Claim examples are hypothetical and used only to illustrate how the insurance is intended to apply. Whether, or to what extent, the insurance applies to a particular claim or loss depends on the circumstances and the terms and conditions of the policy, as issued.