When it comes to automated vehicles (AVs), one of the most significant challenges facing the insurance sector may not be the vehicles themselves, but the enormous volumes of data they will generate and the issues that raises.

AVs are data-generating machines. Industry estimates suggest that AVs could produce up to 19 terabytes of data every hour. Even a vehicle used for less than an hour a day could generate thousands of terabytes of information over the course of a year.

The scale is difficult to comprehend. To put it into perspective, a person who streams an hour of video every day for a year might use a few hundred gigabytes of data annually. An automated vehicle could generate millions of times more information.

That data will come from a range of sources including sensors, cameras, mapping systems, vehicle diagnostics, software logs and communications with surrounding infrastructure. Together, these datasets will provide a detailed picture of how a vehicle operates, the decisions it makes and the environment in which it travels. For insurers, the potential value is immense.

Manufacturers will rely on it to develop and improve automated driving systems. Regulators will use it to assess safety and compliance. Infrastructure providers will use it to understand network performance and traffic management.

For insurers, data could fundamentally transform claims handling and risk assessment.

When an accident occurs involving an AV, the key questions are likely to be very different from those asked today. Rather than focusing solely on driver behaviour, investigations may require an understanding of software performance, sensor inputs, system decisions and vehicle status at the time of the incident.

Access to reliable and timely data may, therefore, become essential for determining liability, assessing causation and resolving claims efficiently.

And it needs to be remembered that under the Automated and Electric Vehicles Act 2018, insurers will be directly liable for the AVs they insure when the incident is caused by the AV driving itself.

Without access to the necessary post-collision dataset, insurers may find themselves attempting to investigate highly technical incidents with only a partial view of what happened.

Automated Passenger Services (APS) are already being tested, with passenger operations expected to go live for passengers in early 2027. The full implementation of the Automated Vehicles Act is currently scheduled for before the end of next year.

We, therefore, face a relatively short window in which to address the practical challenges associated with vehicle data governance, access rights and cybersecurity.

If these issues are left unresolved, there is a risk that technological capability will outpace the frameworks needed to support insurers, consumers and businesses operating in the AV sector.