According to Valerie McNiven, a cybercrime advisor for the U.S. Treasury, the profits from global cybercrime exceeded profits from illicit drug sales last year. Modern technology certainly does provide a number of novel and unique ways for criminals to take advantage of other people, and in recent years we have seen a clear and apparent increase in instances of digitally perpetrated identity theft, data piracy, and fraud, but are the numbers really reliable? According to McNiven:
"Last year was the first year that proceeds from cybercrime were greater than proceeds from the sale of illegal drugs, and that was, I believe, over $105 billion."
McNiven's assertion is just plain wrong. According to United Nations statistics for 2003, the the global market for illicit substances is estimated at about US$322 billion, more than three times the value of McNiven's estimate, and larger than the GDP of 90 percent of the world's countries. I was unable to find the source from which McNiven got her estimate of $105 billion.
Slashdot Mirror
DeWalt is likely quoting Valerie McNiven, from 2005 - who seemed to be somewhat unreliable even then...
From Ars Technica:
http://arstechnica.com/news.ars/post/20051129-5648.html
According to Valerie McNiven, a cybercrime advisor for the U.S. Treasury, the profits from global cybercrime exceeded profits from illicit drug sales last year. Modern technology certainly does provide a number of novel and unique ways for criminals to take advantage of other people, and in recent years we have seen a clear and apparent increase in instances of digitally perpetrated identity theft, data piracy, and fraud, but are the numbers really reliable? According to McNiven:
"Last year was the first year that proceeds from cybercrime were greater than proceeds from the sale of illegal drugs, and that was, I believe, over $105 billion."
McNiven's assertion is just plain wrong. According to United Nations statistics for 2003, the the global market for illicit substances is estimated at about US$322 billion, more than three times the value of McNiven's estimate, and larger than the GDP of 90 percent of the world's countries. I was unable to find the source from which McNiven got her estimate of $105 billion.