Hunton Insurance Recovery Blog

This series addresses whether your company should consider protecting its products under the SAFETY Act, which serves as a governmental seal of quality and offers powerful litigation and liability benefits.  Part I of this series addressed the benefits of obtaining SAFETY Act coverage.  This post explains the levels of protection under the SAFETY Act and how your company should evaluate whether its products may be eligible.

Congratulations to Jae Lynn Huckaba on winning the Miami-Dade Bar Association Young Lawyer Section’s inaugural Rookie of the Year Award. This year, the MDB YLS Officers created the Rookie of the Year Award to recognize one new MDB Board of Director who consistently moves the YLS forward. President of the YLS, Beau Blumberg, stated, “Jae Lynn jumped right into the YLS, helping wherever it was needed, from the Breakfast with the Judiciary event to Miami Nights to multiple service projects and social events. After one year, we know Jae Lynn is destined for great things in the YLS.”

In a recent featured article for Aon plc, Hunton Andrews Kurth insurance coverage lawyers Kevin Small and Alice Weeks, along with Aon’s Adam Furmansky, discussed the evolving nature of social engineering claims and the importance of understanding how an insured’s crime policy will respond to these claims.

Human beings are social creatures. In today’s world, social media platforms are ever-growing and there are more users than ever before. But, at what cost? The use of social media has consequences. Policyholders should look to their CGL insurers for defense coverage, under Coverage A or Coverage B.

Novolex Holdings, LLC v. Illinois Union Insurance Company is one of the few cases involving a claim under a Representation and Warranties (“R&W”) policy playing out in a public forum because most R&W cases are resolved before a formal dispute and often don’t reach litigation. In addition, most R&W policies provide the policyholder with the option to have the dispute resolved through arbitration, which many clients may prefer so as to avoid the public scrutiny of a court case. Novolex, however, is one of the few cases that has proceeded to litigation.

In November 2023 and January 2024, Hunton Andrews Kurth LLP released the first two issues of its AI and Emerging Technologies Newsletter. Both publications featured contributions from insurance coverage partner Michael Levine and associate Alex Pappas, which analyze significant issues at the intersection of insurance and AI.  

Washington, DC-based partner Michael Levine has been recognized for his extensive experience and insights into emerging and legacy property and business interruption insurance coverage issues by being selected to Law360’s 2024 Editorial Advisory Board for Insurance Authority Property. As a member of the board, Mike will provide feedback on Law360’s coverage of property issues and expert insight on how best to shape future reporting of issues affecting businesses across all industry sectors.

The SAFETY Act is a highly effective risk management tool created to incentivize the development of anti-terrorism technologies—broadly defined—and to provide protections to providers of products and services meant to prevent or mitigate physical and cyber-attacks.  Among other benefits, companies receiving SAFETY Act coverage for their technologies have their potentially liability associated with an act of terrorism capped at the amount of insurance coverage required by the U.S. Department of Homeland Security (“DHS”).  Companies seeking to reduce their exposure to liability associated with cyber or physical attacks should consider applying for designation or certification under the SAFETY Act.  DHS has also approved a wide variety of other technologies and security programs for protection under the SAFETY Act. 

As we explained in our introductory post, rapid advancements in artificial intelligence (AI) present multifaceted risks for businesses of all types. The magnitude, fluidity and specificity of these risks underscore why businesses should continually audit their own unique AI risks profiles to best understand and respond to the hazards posed by AI.

New York’s Commercial Division is a sophisticated forum for resolving complex commercial disputes.  The Commercial Division has many advantages over other forums: judges are hand-selected for their experience with commercial cases, discovery procedures are streamlined to save time and money, and dispute resolution is encouraged early and often.  However, the several sets of overlapping rules governing practice in the Commercial Division can intimidate outsiders and trip up the uninformed.