Slashdot Mirror


Hackers Stole $172 Billion From People Last Year (symantec.com)

Yearly report published by security firm Norton estimates that as many as 978 million people in 20 countries lost money to cybercrime last year. On an average, the firm says, victims lost an average of $142 and spent nearly 24 hours dealing with the fallout of their attack.

47 comments

  1. Love it by GeekWithAKnife · · Score: 3, Insightful


    Very detailed article. I'm impressed.

    Although I do wonder, how much did they get away with and keep as opposed to get caught and got to jail?

    --
    A 'singular oddity' is an event that cannot be explained and only happens when you are alone.
    1. Re:Love it by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      Bitcoin payments made internationally. What, you think Interpol is way out of their league to both deal with the issue, and prioritize chasing a fast moving target. The hackers are in and out in a flash on the web.

    2. Re:Love it by DontBeAMoran · · Score: 2

      Well, there's your problem. Stop using Flash!

      --
      #DeleteFacebook
  2. Really? by cascadingstylesheet · · Score: 2

    172 billion? That's all??

    1. Re:Really? by azcoyote · · Score: 1

      172 billion? That's all??

      You don't think that's a lot? Judging by Slashdot, that is more than the total value of Netflix. Of course watching Netflix's line-up is sometimes like watching the movies on MST3k without the riffing... so I'm guessing that's why people are willing to pay more to hackers than to Netflix.

      --
      Incipiamus, fratres, servire Domino Deo, quia hucusque vix vel parum in nullo profecimus.
    2. Re:Really? by cascadingstylesheet · · Score: 1

      172 billion? That's all??

      You don't think that's a lot? Judging by Slashdot, that is more than the total value of Netflix. Of course watching Netflix's line-up is sometimes like watching the movies on MST3k without the riffing... so I'm guessing that's why people are willing to pay more to hackers than to Netflix.

      For the whole world, for the whole year, as much high profile hacking as was going on?

      Well, I was expecting more anyway ...

    3. Re:Really? by Opportunist · · Score: 1

      So ... they stole Netflix.

      TWICE!

      Could be worse...

      --
      We used to have a Bill of Rights. Now, with the rights gone, all we have left is the bill.
    4. Re:Really? by bluefoxlucid · · Score: 1

      I mean, I'm feeling a little shrinkage here. I'm running for Congress to do a lot of things, one being to end identity theft. Identity theft cost Americans $16 billion in 2017, down from $24.7 billion in 2012. We can fix this easily; it's actually trivial.

      All electronic theft is not the same thing.

      ... I can't fix this. I can fix one particular type of theft because it happens to be easy to fix. I can't end ransomware or bank arbitrage scams where someone asks you to wire them $6,000 and you legitimately send them $6,000.

      I can guarantee an end to less than ten percent of all this.

    5. Re:Really? by RespekMyAthorati · · Score: 1

      I can guarantee an end to less than ten percent of all this.

      OK, one percent is less than ten percent. Suppose you "end" 1% "of all this"?
      That still leaves 99% to deal with.

    6. Re:Really? by bluefoxlucid · · Score: 1

      That's the problem, yeah; although we have some hard numbers here (about $16 billion for the part I can fix, $172 billion for all of it).

      On the other hand, never having to worry about someone 3,000 miles away with a fake ID opening a new credit card or mortgage in your name is a definite plus.

  3. Stole from people? by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

    Or corporations? Or are corporations people?

    It's pretty much a victimless crime, though. They can just write it off.

    1. Re:Stole from people? by kenh · · Score: 2

      I'll play - so let's say a corporation losses $1M, so they write it off - let's say it was a very successful company, so if they had not lost that $1M in profits they would have paid an estimated $350K in federal income taxes on it (under previous tax code in US), denying the federal government several hundred thousand dollars in tax revenue. But wait, there are also state and local taxes that will not be collected on that $1M, denying those governments tens of thousands in tax revenue, not to mention the remaining $500K plus that was not distributed to shareholders to spend or invest in America (assuming the thieves were foreign).

      That doesn't sound "victimless" to me

      --
      Ken
    2. Re:Stole from people? by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      the hackers just happened to be dumping the bitcoins in their kids off shore accounts, all is well

    3. Re:Stole from people? by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      Kramer: It's a write off for them.
      Jerry: How is it a write off?
      Kramer: They just write it off.
      Jerry: Write it off of what?
      Kramer: They just write it off!
      Jerry: You don't even know what a write off is, do you?
      Kramer: No. Do you?

  4. Math? by NEDHead · · Score: 1

    978M people at average $142 equals $139B

    1. Re:Math? by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 1

      They could have used a median in stead of a mean.

      Average, it's an ambiguous word.

    2. Re:Math? by NEDHead · · Score: 0

      Average and mean are exact synonyms. Median and mode are also words, but they are not synonyms to average or mean.

    3. Re:Math? by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 1

      The first paragraph of wikipedia for the word "average"

      In colloquial language, an average is a middle or typical number of a list of numbers. Different concepts of average are used in different contexts. Often "average" refers to the arithmetic mean, the sum of the numbers divided by how many numbers are being averaged; in mathematics and statistics, this would be called the arithmetic mean. In statistics, mean, median, and mode are all known as measures of central tendency, and in colloquial usage sometimes any of these might be called an average value.

      As I said, average is an ambiguous term. I guess I could have thrown mode at it as well.

    4. Re:Math? by Plus1Entropy · · Score: 1

      It might most commonly refer to mean, but median and mode are also synonyms of average.

      --
      Only crack the nuts that crack. You don't put the ones that don't crack in the sack.
    5. Re:Math? by NEDHead · · Score: 1

      I suppose molar and molal are the same too. They're both words used in chemistry after all.

  5. We need a wall to keep the hackers out by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

    And they should pay for it.

    1. Re:We need a wall to keep the hackers out by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      274 times a day? That's gotta smart after a while!

    2. Re:We need a wall to keep the hackers out by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      Lots of lube, brah.

      - Tyrone

  6. Interesting.. by sqorbit · · Score: 2

    Interesting data, interesting read. I do tend to read reports about security from companies trying to sell me security products with a bit of doubt though. Is it really good for business if Symantec puts out a report that shows anything but increasing security issues and data to help sell their products? One data point that's interesting is - "Having a device infected by a virus or other security threat (53%)". That number to me just shows how some people only believe they have a security issue when they see something actually happening to their devices. Judging from the amount of Apple, Microsoft and Google updates for security I would think that almost 100% of people had a device that would fall into the "other security threat" category.

    --
    Sent from my TARDIS
  7. Code ... by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

    Bones that see a word.
    Bones that don't.
    Your eye's the one that sees the word.
    Your butt's the one that don't.

  8. Amazed if the math holds up by jokkebk · · Score: 1

    I would be really amazed if 1 B people ACTUALLY lost $142 in a year, it's like 30 M average Americans losing $1500 each. There is ransomware and credit card theft, but former is still rare (1 % of net users is likely high ballpark) and latter covered by credit card companies.

    If corporate cybercrime is counted, sure, but the $172 B figure sounds like those sums that people calculate are lost standing in red lights. Kinda money... but actually really not.

    Of course, didn't yet RTFA, checking that out next!

    --
    http://codeandlife.com
  9. "contradictory beliefs" by cascadingstylesheet · · Score: 4, Insightful

    Nearly one in four believe stealing information online is not as bad as stealing property in ‘real life’

    That depends entirely on what you mean by "information".

    Believing that Disney et al 's hijacking of copyright to totally pervert the system from what the founders intended is a travesty that deserves civil disobedience is not a "contradictory belief" to also believing you shouldn't steal your neighbor's stuff.

    You can go to prison for copying Steamboat Willie 90 years after it was published.

    1. Re: "contradictory beliefs" by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      Steamboat willie is a racist cartoon anyway. When you finally realize willie is black and it's a meme for being a slave.

      Tooot tooot slashdotters.

  10. 25% of people with internet access by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 1

    So if 51% of the world has no internet access that would mean 978/3500 ~= 25% or 1 in 4 people got done, which seems incredibly high, i smell stats gouging.

    1. Re:25% of people with internet access by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      Of course. It's in Norton's best interest to sell you FUD.

    2. Re:25% of people with internet access by Opportunist · · Score: 1

      Hey, they can't hold a candle to McAfee.

      --
      We used to have a Bill of Rights. Now, with the rights gone, all we have left is the bill.
  11. Software bugs exploited by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0, Insightful

    A lot of cybercrime is due to exploiting vulnerabilities in software. I find it amazing how buggy software really is, and that definitely contributes to the staggering amounts of cybercrime. It's frequently the result of poorly written software and poorly designed hardware. Every few days, I get notifications in Ubuntu that I need to install a new version of the Linux kernel because it's a security update, then I have to reboot my system. It's open source software, with supposedly large numbers of people contributing and reviewing the code. With all the people supposedly working on the Linux kernel, you'd think the developers would produce better code, and it wouldn't be necessary to constantly issue bug fixes for security holes. I'm just surprised and disappointed that Linux developers aren't writing better code that isn't full of bugs, which require updates every few days.

    1. Re:Software bugs exploited by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      "i find it amazing how buggy software really is"

      said someone who obviously isn't a programmer.

      code is horrendously complex, it's actually a wonder that so much of it WORKS.

  12. $172 Billion? Really? by kenh · · Score: 1

    The numbers in the summary don't add up to $172 Billion, when I multiply 978 million victims times average estimated loss of $142 I come up with $138,876,000,000 - a lot of money, but not $172 Billion.

    --
    Ken
  13. Clickbaity clickbait is clickbaity clickbait by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

    Corporations are "persons". And no, "just writing it off" just means the damage gets spead out, like across all the taxpayers.

    That doesn't mean this is a useful report and not a breathless piece of clickbaiting crap that this batch of editors just love to death. I'm amazed they linked it directly and not via some breathless nitwit cyber-scare copy-paste site like bleepingcomputer. It matters about as much as the entire security industry does: You get less than a cent of worth on the dollar of expense. Needlessly so. Way less.

  14. Not at all good Re:Love it by ET3D · · Score: 2

    It's a really confusing article, where the numbers are handpicked to make it look like a serious problem. It's not at all clear what the losses were for (considering that the most prevalent 'crime' was virus infection, I imagine that most of the money went to PC/phone repair people), it's not at all clear how individuals in each country were affected (except for the time spent dealing with the aftermath), and the graph '53% of consumers experienced cybercrime...' is deliberately misleading by doubling each row by sticking the sum to the right of the first two bars.

    In short, complete and utter FUD.

  15. Wow, Fake News? by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

    We live in a very fake news era, and this type of fake news (fearmongering) favours Synmatec garbage Norton antivirus a lot.

    Give us the links and sources to check this $172 billion garbage.

  16. So you are saying that spending $100 billion by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

    ...on hitmen and Predator drones to take out hackers would be a good investment.

    1. Re:So you are saying that spending $100 billion by Opportunist · · Score: 1

      Nah. Same reason it's uneconomic to off politicians. You kill one, but the next one is there in line to take his place.

      --
      We used to have a Bill of Rights. Now, with the rights gone, all we have left is the bill.
  17. Part of why I wrote this to help stop it by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

    See subject & APK Hosts File Engine 10++ SR-1 32/64-bit https://www.google.com/search?hl=en&source=hp&biw=&bih=&q=%22APK+Hosts+File+Engine%22+and+%22start64%22&btnG=Google+Search&gbv=1/ for blocking bad domains/subdomains malware makers + botnet herders etc. use & IF they wouldn't permit hosting providers to allow UNLIMITED subdomains beneath a single CHEAP domain you'd have a hell of a lot less of the type of crime the article alludes to happening (as cost becomes a factor for the malware maker prohibiting the creation of endless domains full of malicious content).

    APK

    P.S.=> I wasn't AWARE of cases w/ $1 per domain w/ unlimited subdomains as last time I looked for pricing on them was 14++ yrs. ago & it changed from what I remember (not as easy for a malwaremaker/botnet herder though to manage OR store either (bright side of 'more' on their end) per https://yro.slashdot.org/comments.pl?sid=11532533&cid=55833641/ ))... apk

  18. That's peanuts by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

    Banks have stolen a lot more money from a lot more people than hackers have. Only politicians have stolen more. Eat the rich.

  19. More than Ukrainian GDP by OrangeTide · · Score: 1

    Ukraine's GDP is about $108B, which is surprising because you'd think they'd see some of that $172B of hacker funds.

    --
    “Common sense is not so common.” — Voltaire
  20. what to buy? by originalGMC · · Score: 1

    hmmm 172 billion, what to buy ...... Comcast? https://www.google.com/search?...

  21. Shadow money for CIA by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

    NSA and CIA wrote most of these hacker tools. Even with the tools leaking, do you actually think any significant amount of this money went to random people getting hold of the tools? It went right back to the people who made the tools for these purposes. It's nothing short of an act of war on the world.

  22. Bullshit Statistics by RespekMyAthorati · · Score: 1
    These guys count the following as poor security practices:

    1. writing your passwords on a piece of paper.
    ---This is an issue with a home PC only if a burglar gets hold of it.
    ---You could always keep it in your wallet.
    2. using "false identities" on the internet.
    ---How the hell does that make you less secure?
    ---Using fake id's for unimportant accounts make you more secure.