Cybercrime costs Netherlands €10 billion annually

Cybercrime costs the Dutch government and companies about 10 billion euros a year, according to an analysis done by Deloitte. The public sector and technology sector in particular are hit hard by cybercrime, NU.nl reports.

Deloitte looked at damages suffered by, for example, the theft of intellectual property, the release of sensitive data and theft of money. The public sector is hit the hardest, with annual damages of around 2.4 billion euros a year, followed by the technology sector with 1.1 billion euros in annual damages. Also vulnerable to cybercrime are defense and aerospace organizations with 415 million euros in annual damages and banks with 360 million euros.

According to Deloitte, the 10 billion lost euros should be considered one of the costs of digitization, which also brings in a large amount of wealth. "Cybercrime is unfortunately inseparably connected to this, but also manageable", Maarten van Wieren, cyber security expert at Deloitte, said. "As cyber incidents can never be completely prevented, it is important to minimize the negative impact with good detection and rapid response."