Cybercrime has cost SA R3.7 billion over the past 12 months, and globally, every day, 1.5 million people are the victims of cybercrime.
Furthermore, every second, 18 adults become a victim of cybercrime, resulting in more than one-and-a-half million cybercrime victims each day on a global level. With losses totalling an average of US $197 per victim across the world and R1 550 per victim in SA in direct financial costs, cybercrime costs consumers more than a week's worth of nutritious food necessities for a family of four.
These alarming facts are contained in the recently-released Norton Cybercrime Report 2012. The report looked at the impact on and the cost to consumers of cybercrime worldwide.
The report was compiled using self-reported experiences from more 13 000 respondents in 24 countries.
"New technologies change Internet use," according to Nadia Hufkie, marketing director, emerging Markets EMEA. "Cybercrime has gone mobile and social."
Since 2010, mobile vulnerabilities have doubled, Hufkie added. Two thirds of the adults surveyed used their mobile devices to access the Internet, making mobile devices a popular target for cyber criminals.
This increase in mobile and social cybercrime is in line with the increasing number of mobile devices on the market. Social networks have also increased in popularity and cyber criminals have picked up on this shift in trends and have evolved as the technology has.
According to Hufkie, cyber criminals migrate to platforms that are popular and therefore experience the most traffic. The report shows that one in five adults globally and almost one in three in South Africa have been victims of either social or mobile cybercrime. Worldwide, 39% of social network users have been victims of social cybercrime.
In SA, the situation appears very serious, with 80% of those surveyed locally reporting having been victims of cybercrime.
Passwords
The report also revealed that although most Internet users follow the basic steps to protect themselves, deleting suspect emails and suchlike, other core precautions are being ignored. "40% don't use complex passwords or change their passwords frequently and more than a third do not check for the padlock symbol in the browser before entering sensitive personal information, such as banking details, online."
Hufkie says that strong passwords are key to fighting the scourge of cybercrime.
"With people sending, receiving, and storing everything from personal photos, to work-related correspondence and documents to bank statements and passwords for other online accounts, those email accounts can be a potential gateway for criminals looking for personal and corporate information."
"Personal email accounts often contain the keys to your online kingdom. Not only can criminals gain access to everything in your inbox, they can also reset your passwords for any other online site you may use by clicking the 'forgot your password' link, intercepting those emails and effectively locking you out of your own accounts," concludes Adam Palmer, Norton lead cyber security advisor. "Protect your email accordingly by using complex passwords and changing them regularly."
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