Originally posted on Bleeping Computer by Ionut Ilascu
The Federal Bureau of Investigation has published its annual report on cybercrime affecting victims in the U.S., noting a record number of complaints and financial losses in 2020 compared to the previous year.
The Internet Crime Complaint Center (IC3) received last year 791,790 complaints – up by 69% from 2019 – of suspected internet crime causing more than $4 billion in losses.
While most complaints were for phishing, non-payment/non-delivery scams, and extortion, about half of the losses are accounted by business email compromise (BEC), romance and confidence scams, and investment fraud.
According to the IC3 report, BEC or email account compromise (EAC) scams recorded 19,369 complaints in 2020, which is 19% less than last year. However, this type of cybercrime alone caused $1.8 million in losses, up from $1.7 billion in 2019.
Crane Hassold, senior director of threat research at Agari, told BleepingComputer that the difference could be explained by many threat actors “pivoting to unemployment/SBA/PPP fraud in the middle of the year.”
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