Cybercriminals have stolen an unprecedented $16.6 billion in 2024, according to the FBI’s annual Internet Crime Complaint Center (IC3) report. This marks a significant 33% increase in losses compared to the previous year.

The IC3 documented 859,532 complaints, with 256,256 resulting in actual financial losses, averaging $19,372 per incident. Americans over 60 were disproportionately affected, filing 147,127 complaints with losses totaling approximately $4.8 billion.

“Fraud represented the bulk of reported losses in 2024, and ransomware was again the most pervasive threat to critical infrastructure, with complaints rising 9% from 2023,” stated B. Chad Yarbrough, FBI’s Operations Director for Criminal and Cyber.

The scale of cybercrime reporting has grown dramatically since IC3’s founding. Initially receiving about 2,000 complaints monthly, the center now processes more than 2,000 complaints daily. Over the past five years, IC3 has recorded 4.2 million complaints linked to $50.5 billion in losses, averaging 836,000 complaints annually.

However, these figures likely represent only a fraction of actual cybercrime losses. Many incidents go undetected or unreported, and the statistics only include direct ransom payments without accounting for business interruption costs, recovery expenses, or third-party remediation services.

The FBI recently warned that scammers are now impersonating IC3 employees, offering to “help” fraud victims recover money lost to other scams, creating a secondary victimization scheme.