Malware and malicious insiders account for most government cybercrime costs
They have also resulted in a large growth in cybersecurity expenditure across the Australian government and other organisations.While this trend is not unique to this nation and cyber-based acts on government agencies across the globe are on the rise, Australia’s reliance on technology for the provision of government services means the effects of cybercrime on citizens have the potential to be incredibly far reaching.A recent study by Accenture and the Ponemon Institute found that cybercrime is increasing in numbers and in scope. The study, which surveyed 2647 security and IT executives across 355 global organisations, found that then average number of security breaches per government agency was 190 in 2018, well ahead of the 14 experienced, on average, by private sector companies.The study also found that for public sector organisations, the average cost of security breach rose 17 per cent in 2018 to an average of US$10.28 million per incident, up from US$9.38 million in 2017.