Global Cybercrime Cost Estimates

It took Enron, Tyco and Worldcom meltdowns for the SEC to institute rules to restore confidence in financial reporting of publicly traded institutions. While corporate fraud is definitely not gone, it has slowed. Corporate fraud unrecovered losses rose from $45B to $60B in the last five years. In that same period, unrecovered cybercrime losses rose from $60B to $110B. From another perspective, Cybercrime Magazine projects that worldwide cybercrime will grow at the rate of 15% YOY and hit a staggering $10.5T in 2025.  In 2024, the transfer of wealth via cybercrime is so vast it is the third largest economy in the world. You can fund a lot of terrorism and digital anarchy with that kind of money.  We've all seen the face of sheer evil - of what funds directed to terrorism will build. And yet - and yet - we are not significantly altering our approach to cybersecurity. Are we INSANE? How much time do you think we have to fix this problem of insecurity? I consider the new SEC rules for Cybersecurity Risk Management, Strategy, Governance, and Incident Disclosure to be a GIFT. We need to learn how to maximize its benefits and stop thinking like victims. I share thoughts on how at https://lnkd.in/geVXrnuE. I would love to hear your comments and questions for future articles.

As we look at cybersecurity, I have always found it useful to look at our networks through a hacker's eyes. This is the first step to looking at security posture as an actual operational fight rather than a never-ending, administrative compliance requirement. As the military has taught me, before planning any operation, we must know our enemy--a term, we have used for this is getting the intelligence update. Intelligence often focuses on the characteristics, organization, finances, and pattern of life of the enemy with whom we have conflict. Although often we think of Al Qaida or the Islamic State in this role, I think it has been very useful to look at Cyber Criminals this way. Only by fully understanding the nature of cybercrime, and the associated criminals, can we optimize our defenses. Additionally, this view helps break down unuseful stereotypes on hackers; how many people still think cyber criminals are merely disorganized and disgruntled loners? Or are they at the edges of our society, in their parents' basement eating pizza? This report from ChainAnalysis that was further published in Forbes does a lot to help frame the cybercrime problem differently. I have posted the article for a more detailed read, but I also wanted to pull out a few key points. https://lnkd.in/e78jRqmM First, CyberCrime has hit $ 1 Billion in 2023. That statistic puts cybercrime in the discussion with National GDPs as it is equal to or greater than 20 National Economies in the world. Put another way, if a person were to try and spend all of the money from 2023's cybercrime spree, it would take 25 years to spend it all if a person spent $100,000 per day. This is big business, and we need to realize that often these criminal organizations are sophisticated. Second, this money is having to be laundered in many different areas. Converting the ransoms to other currencies in a variety of areas suggests sophistication similar to the drug cartels.  Finally, the barrier to conducting cyber-crimes has been substantially reduced as we have seen a monetization of LogSellers, Credential Theft as a Service, RansomwareAsAService (RaaS), and Hacking Platform as a Service. By commoditizing these areas, brokers have lowered the technical skills needed to enter the arena. I conclude to say, that beating cybercrime needs a fundamental transition from mere administrative GRC work to an organized, operational view of beating a competent, motivated, and capable enemy.  Neil Resources: Forbes: https://lnkd.in/e6wZTsAE crime-report/amp/ ChainAnalysis: https://lnkd.in/eWkKgV7e DataDrivenInvestor: https://lnkd.in/e7ejY-Ak

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