ALBANY — As the New York Department of Financial Services sought to regulate “unscrupulous practices” in the title insurance industry, title insurers increased their lobbying in the state, official disclosures reviewed by the New York Law Journal show.

As DFS finalized new title insurance regulations in 2017, title and property insurers spent roughly $658,000 lobbying the legislature, Gov. Andrew Cuomo and the Department of Financial Services itself, disclosures on file with the Joint Commission on Public Ethics show, a 57 percent increase from a year earlier. In 2016, the industry had spent just $419,000 on lobbying efforts, according to public records.