CSIO’s 2024 Members’ Meeting and Reception Celebrates Last Year’s Accomplishments

(Toronto – April 19, 2024) On Thursday, April 18, CSIO hosted its 2024 Members’ Meeting and Reception at the One King West Hotel in Toronto. The event featured a celebration of CSIO and its members’ 2023 accomplishments, an awards ceremony, a keynote address titled Cybersecurity: Safeguarding Our Digital Frontiers, and a reception.

In his opening remarks, Michael Lin, CSIO’s Chairman of the Board and Chief Information Officer at Travelers Canada, welcomed members and recognized 2023 as a year of gaining momentum. “It’s a pleasure to share that CSIO successfully completed the first year of its multi-year strategic plan and continues to advance the property & casualty (P&C) industry,” said Lin.

2023 Highlights

Catherine Smola, President and CEO of CSIO, spoke about how CSIO and its members came together to streamline P&C insurance operations in 2023. “CSIO continuously drives innovation through Data Standards and technology to benefit our members and their customers,” said Smola. “In reflecting on last year’s achievements, they share a common theme – onward as one.”

CSIO’s eDocs Working Group was commended by Smola for successfully updating the eDocs codes and descriptions. “Through industry collaboration, we achieved our goal of developing clearly labelled eDocs that will save brokers time and money,” said Smola. Also noted were the eDocs Programming Scorecard, which displays insurer and broker management system (BMS) vendor members’ programming dates for the updated eDocs codes and descriptions, and the eDocs Steering Committee, which will ensure successful industry implementation.

Smola also acknowledged the Standards Governance Advisory Council, which was established in 2023. The Council is part of CSIO’s multi-year strategic plan to ensure a consistent interpretation of Data Standards by insurers and BMS vendors.

Next, Smola echoed Michael Lin’s comments on CSIO’s Commercial Lines (CL) Working Group advancing CL Data Standards. The Working Group published CL Data Standards for the hospitality, health services and warehousing industry sectors, bringing the total number of sectors to seven.

Both Smola and Lin thanked the Innovation and Emerging Technology (INNOTECH) Advisory Committee and its Application Programming Interface (API) Security Working Group for their efforts. The Working Group launched an API Security Standards Certification program, which confirms an insurer or BMS vendor’s alignment with CSIO’s API Security Standards.

Additionally, Smola reflected on the API Implementation Working Groups’ progress in advancing JavaScript Object Notation (JSON) API Data Standards. The Working Groups completed the business requirements for an additional 165 use cases and published a JSON API Implementation Guide and JSON API Standards for technical schemas.

Furthermore, Smola and Lin praised CSIO’s achievements in continuing to deliver secure and reliable solutions through CSIOnet and My Proof of Insurance (MPOI). Lin highlighted that “a record number of over 48 million eDocs were sent through CSIOnet” and Smola noted a 10.3% increase in the volume of messages sent via CSIOnet. Smola then spoke about MPOI’s security and functionality enhancements and also shared that since MPOI was launched in 2018, members have sent over 2.5 million digital documents, including eSlips, to customers.

Lastly, Smola recognized CSIO’s Professional Development milestones, such as introducing a fourth education stream on Industry Trends & Initiatives, launching an ethics webinar and course, and adding new technology trends courses.

During the awards portion of the event, Smola congratulated L’Unique General Insurance for achieving Level III CL Certification and Northbridge Insurance for being the first insurer member to earn CSIO’s API Security Standards Certification.

Keynote Speaker: Andrew Kirsch, Cybersecurity Expert

Following the remarks, this year’s keynote speaker, Andrew Kirsch, Founder of Kirsch Group and former Intelligence Officer with the Canadian Security Intelligence Service (CSIS), delivered an engaging presentation about cybersecurity in Canada. Mr. Kirsch spoke about the growing cybersecurity threats and how organizations can better protect themselves.

New Members of the Board of Directors

CSIO welcomes its newest members of the Board of Directors:

• Noel Feghali, President & Co-Founder of Panda7
• Dwight Heppner, Chief Technology Officer at Guild Insurance
• Rosalind Staples-Simpson, Senior Vice President - Commercial Lines at Intact Insurance

CSIO Award of Distinction: Sheldon Wasylenko

Lin also announced that CSIO’s Vice-Chair of the Board of Directors, Sheldon Wasylenko, General Manager of Rayner Agencies Ltd., has stepped down from the Board after 19 years of service. Mr. Wasylenko was presented with an Award of Distinction for his contributions to advancing the broker channel and the P&C industry.

To learn more about everything CSIO achieved last year, check out the CSIO 2023 Annual Report. CSIO’s updated Board of Directors can be found here.

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About Centre for Study of Insurance Operations (CSIO)

CSIO is Canada’s industry technology association of property and casualty insurers, vendors and over 38,000 brokers. CSIO is committed to driving innovative solutions that enable the best insurance experience in Canada by overseeing the development, implementation, and maintenance of technology Standards and solutions, such as CSIOnet, eDocs, and My Proof of Insurance. The CSIO XML Standard is licensed to CSIO by ACORD (Association for Cooperative Operations Research and Development). For more information, visit csio.com.

For further information, please contact:

Debbie Vassos, BBA, CDMP | Manager, Marketing & Communications
110 Yonge Street, Suite 500 | Toronto, ON M5C 1T4
(416) 360-1773 x 1721 | 1 (800) 463-2746 x 1721
dvassos@csio.com | www.csio.com