FBI Reports $2.7 Billion in Cybercrime Losses for 2018
The FBI’s Internet Crime Complaint Centre (IC3) has released its 2018 Internet Crime Report and, while its contents mostly relate to cybercrime in the US, its findings aren't good.
Losses amount to a staggering $2.7 billion and result from 351,936 cybercrime complaints, a steady increase from 2014 when the figures totalled $800.5 million and 269,422 respectively.
Stories with big numbers, such as the Sony hack and WannaCry and NonPetya ransomware, make for good headlines. However, the IC3 report shows that many cybercrimes involve no hacking at all.
The most common crime types are non-payment/non-delivery, extortion, and personal data breach. The top three crime types with the highest loss are business email compromise, confidence/romance fraud, and non-payment/non-delivery. These are all online versions of 'old school' scams - love, investing and stealing. The age of cybercrime victims mirrors that of old school scams, with 43% of victims over 50.
Like the street corner three card monte card game that has fooled countless over the years, many victims of online scams think they are too smart to be outwitted. The IC3 report shows that little has changed over the years and street corner shysters also exist in the online world.
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