FBI Says Crime Definitely Pays

As I always say, the reason we have so much cybercrime is that it really pays.

Here is the “elevator pitch” version.

Remember, this only represents the people who reported the crimes to the FBI. That means that this number is dramatically low.

And, while the number of complaints reported year over year is up and down (but mostly up), the losses are only up. Check out the chart below.

In the last five years, people have reported $50 billion in losses to the FBI. Even if you think that some of these reports are dubious, given that most people don’t report cybercrime at all, these numbers are still low.

Not surprisingly, the biggest category of crime is investments. A hacker plays to the victim’s greed (the return on this investment is 10 times what you can get anywhere else). Likely, if the return is too good to be true, it probably is too good to be true.

The report has a wealth of information, so if you are looking at how to protect yourself or your company, putting more attention on the categories with bigger numbers could make sense.

If you need assistance, please contact us.

You can download the report from the FBI’s ic3 website here.

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