Insurance coverage for technology firms against data breachesthat leak personal information under their control is now availablefrom The Hartford Financial Services Group Inc., the companysaid.

The firm said it is adding first-party data privacy expensecoverage with cyber-extortion expense coverage to its FailSafesuite of technology liability coverages as an endorsement to theFailSafe GIGA and FailSafe TERA policies.

The Hartford Financial noted that many states require companiesto pay for notification and credit monitoring services for thoseaffected by a breach and said a breach involving just 500 recordscould mean a cost exceeding $100,000.

Specific components of the new coverage, the company said, mayinclude:

o Notification expenses incurred to comply with notificationlaws.

o Crisis management expenses incurred for fees and costsassociated with hiring a crisis management firm to perform servicesthat minimize potential harm and maintain or restore confidence inthe policyholder.

o Data privacy regulatory and credit monitoring expensesincurred in connection with a statutory mandate requiring creditmonitoring for third parties in compliance with data privacy laws,legal expenses in defense of a data privacy regulation proceeding,and certain fines or penalties, where insurable, in connection witha data privacy regulation proceeding.

o Cyber-investigation expenses incurred to have a third partyinvestigate the policyholder's computer system to determine thesource of a data privacy breach.