Study reports Houston area among top targets for cybercriminals
Although Texas ranked in the middle of the pack among states victimized for cybercrime in 2020, the Houston-The Woodlands-Sugar Land area was among the metropolises reporting the most cyber identity thefts in the nation, according to a recent study.
Beyond Identity assessed the last decade of cybercrime for its study that found 724 reports of cyber identity theft per 100,000 residents of the Houston communities.
Texas experienced $350 median amount lost to cyber fraud per person in 2020, which fell in the middle of state reporting. Alaska suffered the highest ($500) while West Virginia reported the lowest ($205).
Some of the trends identified by the study are:
- $3.3 billion was lost to fraud in 2020, nearly double the amount lost in 2010.
- More than three times the number of fraud, identity theft, and other cybercrime reports occurred in 2020 (4.72 million) than in 2010 (1.47 million).
- 68 percent of organizations in the U.S. experiencing a ransomware attack paid a ransom. Only 10 percent were attacked but did not pay.
- Delaware saw the largest increase in fraud reports per 100,000 people since 2010.
- Kansas saw the largest increase in identity theft reports per 100,000 people since 2010.
- Residents of the Topeka, Kansas, metro area had the highest incidence of identity theft per capita.
The study based its findings on historic data in the U.S. Federal Trade Commission’s Consumer Sentinel Network Reports.