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Top Bug Hunters Make 2.7 Times More Money Than an Average Software Engineer (bleepingcomputer.com)
An anonymous reader shares a report: A survey of 1,700 bug bounty hunters registered on the HackerOne platform reveals that top white-hat hackers make on average 2.7 times more money than the average salary of a software engineer in the same country. The reported numbers are different for each country and may depend on a bug bunter's ability to find bugs, but the survey's results highlight the rising popularity of bug hunting as a sustainable profession, especially in less developed countries, where it can help talented programmers live a financially care-free life. According to HackerOne's report, it pays to be a vulnerability researcher in India, where top bug hunters can make 16 times more compared to the average salary of a software engineer. Other countries where bug hunting can assure someone a comfortable living are Argentina (x15.6), Egypt (x8.1), Hong Kong (x7.6), the Philippines (x5.4), and Latvia (x5.2).
Ok, but how much does an average bug hunter make vs a top software engineer? Or an average bug hunter vs an average software engineer?
I mean this is an Apples vs Oranges comparison there.
You can take the top of nearly any (professional) profession and compare it to the average of others and you see that the best of the best makes more then the average guy does.
If something is so important that you feel the need to post it on the internet... It probably isn't that important.
Uh... Latvia's a real country, Anonymous Coward. Look it up.
So the top bug hunters make more than the average software engineer? Well slap my ass and call me a cantaloupe!
What about top software engineers compared to average software engineers? What about A-list celebrities vs stuntmen?
I know! How about we compare the top strawmen vs average strawmen?
To everyone complaining about the comparison between the top of bug hunters and the average software engineer, you are clearly missing the point. They aren't trying to present a meaningful comparison of two fields, they are trying to paint a statistically inaccurate picture of luxury in order to flood the market and drive average wages down. C'mon, is this everybody's first day on /. or something?
This is my signature. There are many like it, but this one is mine.
37% of white-hat hackers say they hack as a hobby in their spare time (not their primary job).
About 12% of hackers on HackerOne make $20,000 or more annually from bug bounties.
Over 3% o bug hunters are making more than $100,000 per year.
1.1% are making over $350,000 annually.
13.7% say bounties earned represent 90-100% of their annual income.
India (23%) and the United States (20%) are the top two countries represented on the HackerOne platform, followed by Russia (6%), Pakistan (4%), and the United Kingdom (4%).
Nearly 1 in 4 hackers have not reported a vulnerability that they found because the company didn’t have a channel to disclose it.
US companies have paid over $15 million to bug hunters via HackerOne in 2017.
US bug hunters racked over $4.1 million in bug rewards, while Indian white-hat hackers earned over $3 million.
"Websites" was the overwhelming winner to the question of "What is Your Favorite Kind of Platform or Product to Hack?" with a 70.8% score.
"Money" was not the primary motivation for getting into bug hunting. It ranked only fourth.
XSS was the favorite vulnerability white-hat hackers liked to search for.
(Clipped out some slashvertisement pitching something called burp suite. )
sed -e 's/Chuck Norris/Rajnikant/g' joke > fact
I was planning to be an average developer, but I guess I'll become one of the best bug hunters instead. Because as an average software engineer, I assume that I'd be way better than average at finding bugs than someone who's already made that their career.
I'm not sure why you think that mil/gov contracts can be outsourced outside the country. Normally, there is a restriction that the work be done in country. Which is fine, because they'll pay the extra to have the work done in country.
Your ad here. Ask me how!