The Benefits of Cyber Crime

Yeah I'm gonna go there. Doom and gloom is all we hear, the global economy is losing trillions, companies are getting hacked everywhere, people are losing their data and their identities, but there's always two sides to every story. I'm yet to see someone have a crack at this, so I figured why not?

So, lets drop the doom and gloom for a bit, and have a peek at the benefits of scumbags stealing our money and information:

1. The money is not actually lost

OK so the money doesn't actually disappear into a black hole, it actually goes to people. Sure it may start out with the scuzbuckets who steal it or make it from your information, but they will spend that money, and that will typically be of benefit to a law abiding person. Yay!

2. The "Investment Multiplier Effect"

Which leads us into the next awesome benefit, the macro economic boost that happens when money flows through an economy. Spend, pay tax, spend, pay tax, the cycle continues, and the net effect is a nice boost to the economy. Not bad hey?

3. Downtime

"Dear Staff, we've had a major cyber security breach, and there will be significant downtime while we recover. Please go home for this week". Woot!

4. New industry, new jobs!

Yes, scumbags can now get jobs. Ask yourself - what would they be doing if they weren't stealing our data? Perhaps stealing courier motorcycles, robbing petrol stations, or mugging tourists. Surely this is better?

And let's not forget that people like me now have jobs in this industry. Lucky you!

5. Data security and privacy is a thing

Yes, they're stealing our schnitzel. And that means we have to think about protecting it, and doing better. So continuous improvement. Plenty of frameworks that encompass continuous improvement, so we're FTW there too!

6. The Robin Hood effect

A controversial one here (I'm pretty sure the other points are on the money), but a criminal may be poor, and steal from a rich company. That means he / she can feed his family. Just saying...

7. A reduction in the dumbing down of humanity

Before we were all aware of IT security issues (well some of us are), we were naive and would share all manner of misinformation. Like Chuck Norris died yesterday. I mean he did, but he just shrugged it off. But now that we are becoming aware to all manner of scams, we can see past this, and are no longer sharing this rubbish which, let's face it, just makes people dumber.

8. Make new friends

I've met a lot of really great people in this industry now, over lots of great coffee. That is NEVER a bad thing! You can make new friends too when you lose your identity, and need to speak with agencies to help recover your life.

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So, is your glass half empty? Then get a smaller glass and think about this stuff the next time you get breached!

Got any others that I've missed? Don't forget to pick up your free, um, ... whitepaper. Yeah that's what it is.