ABC’s Cybersecurity Fiduciary Solution has been invaluable to our business. As a fiduciary, we have a responsibility to ensure that our vendors have appropriate cybersecurity controls in place. However, reviewing and analyzing vendor documentation and reports can be extremely time-consuming. ABC’s solution simplifies this process by providing a clear, concise summary of each vendor’s cybersecurity controls, allowing us to quickly identify where controls are in place and where improvements may be needed. It also provides valuable expertise in analyzing and interpreting the data, which may otherwise require significant internal resources and specialized knowledge. Another valuable feature is the ability to compare multiple vendors and their cybersecurity results side by side. This gives us greater insight and confidence when evaluating vendors and making decisions about which providers to work with. ABC’s solution has made our vendor cybersecurity assessments more informed, efficient, and effective.

As benefits professionals, we increasingly recognize that our responsibility to clients extends beyond plan design, compliance, and cost. Employers and plan fiduciaries also need to understand how the vendors entrusted with sensitive employee and benefits information are protecting that data.

Advanced Benefit Consulting’s “Cybersecurity Fiduciary Solution”, a Proprietary Data Security Vetting System provides an extremely valuable solution to what has traditionally been a complicated and time-consuming process.

Properly evaluating benefits administration systems, ACA compliance vendors, payroll vendors, TPAs or other vendors can require reviewing extensive security questionnaires and highly technical information about cybersecurity controls, privacy practices, data handling, system safeguards, and risk management. For most employers, determining what questions to ask—and then evaluating the significance of the answers—can be challenging and overwhelming.

Advanced Benefit Consulting has created a structured platform that does that work for the employer.  Their proprietary system evaluates participating vendors against established industry security standards and translates complex technical information into a detailed, understandable report and a standardized scoring system. Rather than simply confirming that a vendor completed a security questionnaire, the process provides employers with meaningful insight into how that vendor’s security practices measure against recognized standards and where potential areas of concern may exist.

For companies and plan fiduciaries with a responsibility to exercise appropriate due diligence in selecting and monitoring vendors that handle sensitive employee and benefits data, this provides something extremely important: a documented, consistent and repeatable vetting process, as well as a monitoring process.

The standardized scoring methodology is particularly valuable because it gives employers a practical way to evaluate vendors using consistent criteria rather than attempting to interpret lengthy security questionnaires independently.

Advanced Benefit Consulting has taken an increasingly complex area of benefits administration and transformed it into a practical risk-management tool. Their Data Security Vetting System, ABC’s Cybersecurity Fiduciary Solution,  helps employers ask better questions, better understand the vendors they are trusting with sensitive information, and document the due diligence behind those decisions.

For benefits professionals and employers navigating an environment of increasing cybersecurity and data privacy risk, I believe this is an exceptionally valuable service.

This system is also applicable to Vendors that handle sensitive information.  Rather than having to endlessly respond to their clients, they can refer them to Advanced Benefit Consulting, where their Cybersecurity measures can be benchmarked on an annual basis.

Having worked with Advanced Benefit Consulting for over thirty years, we feel that our clients have a trusted solution.  I highly recommend this incredible Fiduciary Solution!