Value of cybercrime equivalent to the third largest global economy

Whoever said 'crime doesn't pay' clearly did so before the advent of the internet. A new report shows that if cybercrime was a country it would be the third largest global economy, valued at $10.5 trillion by 2025. Some 33 billion records are estimated to be stolen in 2023 -- a huge increase of 175 percent from 2018.

The latest Cybercrime Statistics Report from Independent Advisor, shows that last year the cost to US businesses of an average cyberattack amounted to a huge $4.35 million. In addition, 83 percent of organisations got attacked more than once.

It also took on average 277 days for companies to identify and respond to attacks. For breaches that were contained within 200 days, there is an average cost saving of $1.12 million (26.5 percent).

In the UK 31 percent of businesses report being attacked at least once a week. According to the UK government, each attack amounts to an average cost of £4,200 ($5,350) per business -- small businesses average cost £3,080 ($3,920), while medium to large businesses costs amounted to £19,400 ($24,720).

The report shows that in 2021 cybercrime increased by 125 percent, possibly driven by the COVID pandemic. Over 422 million US accounts were affected by compromised data last year, and it's estimated that hackers now attack your computer every 39 seconds -- averaging 2,244 attempts a day.

In the UK the report finds that cybercrimes grew by 40 percent in 2021, and it's now estimated that there's an average of 4,783 victims for every million users. Additionally, UK social media has been targeted with there being a 23.5 percent attack increase over the last year.

You can see the full findings on the Independent Advisor site and there's an infographic summary below.

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