Turning stolen data into money is not difficult, particularly in foreign markets. Since the security breaches can result in hundreds, thousands, or sometimes even millions of credit card numbers or Social Security numbers and other identifying information being compromised, hackers can sell that information cheaply to nefarious customers around the world.
Corporations of all sizes have invested heavily in companywide security, but despite those efforts, cybercrime is only becoming more common, according to the survey, which was sponsored by PricewaterhouseCoopers (PwC), the U.S. Secret Service, the CERT Division of Carnegie Mellon University's Software Engineering Institute and CSO security magazine.
Hackers are always a step ahead of new security protocols and software. said Ed Lowery, who leads the Secret Service's cybercrime investigation efforts.
"Despite substantial investments in cybersecurity technologies, cyber criminals continue to find ways to circumvent these technologies in order to obtain sensitive information that they can monetize," Lowery said. The ability to circumvent expensive security efforts has only resulted in each cyber attack costing businesses larger amounts of money.
Over the past five years, the financial impact of cybercrime has steadily risen, which is bad news for the 75 percent of businesses PwC surveyed that had experienced a security breach in the past 12 months. The 2013 Cost of Cyber Crime Study report from the Ponemon Institute revealed last year that on average, organizations that experience cyber attacks lose $11.56 million every 10...