Title page
Contents
Acknowledgements 9
Acronyms 10
Abstract 11
Summary 12
Victimisation 12
Victim characteristics 14
Help-seeking 15
Impact of victimisation 16
Introduction 18
Method 21
Victimisation 31
Online abuse and harassment 33
Malware 36
Identity crime and misuse 38
Fraud and scams 40
Poly-victimisation 43
Victim characteristics 45
Sociodemographic characteristics 45
Education and employment 48
Technology use and online activities 50
Digital literacy and online safety strategies 56
Help-seeking by victims following the most recent incident 62
Sources of help, advice or support 62
Reporting to police or to ReportCyber 67
Impacts of victimisation 82
Financial losses 82
Impacts on individual victims 89
Impact on small to medium businesses 95
References 98
Appendix: Survey design, sampling and weighting 102
Introduction 102
Key definitions 102
Survey design 103
Research ethics 106
Sampling and weighting 106
Table 1. Sociodemographic characteristics of respondents 25
Table 2. Education, employment and income of respondents 26
Table 3. Online behaviour of respondents 27
Table 4. Incidents of online abuse and harassment 34
Table 5. Symptoms of malware 37
Table 6. Incidents of Identity crime and misuse 39
Table 7. Incidents of fraud and scams 41
Table 8. Cybercrime victimisation by crime type and sociodemographic characteristics 47
Table 9. Cybercrime victimisation by crime type and respondent education, employment and income 49
Table 10. Cybercrime victimisation, by crime type and frequency of online activities 55
Table 11. Cybercrime victimisation, by use of online safety measures 59
Table 12. Cybercrime victimisation, by use of higher risk online behaviours 61
Table 13. Respondents who sought help from police or ReportCyber, by sociodemographic characteristics 71
Table 14. Respondents who sought help from police or ReportCyber following most recent incident, by business ownership status 72
Table 15. Reasons for not reporting to police or ReportCyber, by crime type 81
Table 16. Money lost, money spent on consequences and money recovered following most recent incident of cybercrime, by crime type 83
Table 17. Median financial losses for most recent incident among victims who lost any money, by payment method (range) 85
Table 18. Harms to individual cybercrime victims 93
Table 19. Harms to small business owners, operators and managers who were victims of cybercrime 96
Figure 1. Respondents by usual place of residence 24
Figure 2. Prevalence of cybercrime victimisation 32
Figure 3. Relationship between victim and offender in the most recent online abuse and harassment incident 36
Figure 4. Overlap of cybercrimes experienced by respondents 44
Figure 5. Cybercrime victimisation, by crime type and age group 45
Figure 6. Cybercrime victimisation, by crime type and social media use 50
Figure 7. Cybercrime victimisation, by crime type and frequency of internet use 51
Figure 8. Cybercrime victimisation, by crime type and number of hours spent using the internet per day for personal use 52
Figure 9. Cybercrime victimisation among respondents who were working, by crime type and number of hours spent using the internet for work 53
Figure 10. Cybercrime victimisation, by crime type and self-rated knowledge of technology 57
Figure 11. Cybercrime victimisation, by crime type and self-rated ability to use technology 57
Figure 12. Help-seeking among online abuse and harassment victims following the most recent incident 63
Figure 13. Help-seeking among malware victims following the most recent incident 64
Figure 14. Help-seeking among identity crime and misuse victims following the most recent incident 65
Figure 15. Help-seeking among fraud and scam victims following the most recent incident 66
Figure 16. Number of sources of help, advice and support among victims who sought help following the most recent incident 67
Figure 17. Help-seeking from selected sources following the most recent incident 68
Figure 18. Reasons for seeking help, advice or support from police or ReportCyber following the most recent incident, by crime type 74
Figure 19. Outcomes of reporting among victims who reported the most recent incident to police or ReportCyber, by crime type 75
Figure 20. Satisfaction with the outcome of reporting among victims who reported to police or ReportCyber, by crime type 77
Figure 21. Length of time taken to submit a report to police following the most recent incident, by crime type 79
Figure 22. Length of time taken to submit a report to ReportCyber following the most recent incident, by crime type 79
Figure 23. Prevalence of victims who recovered any money following most recent incident 83
Figure 24. Prevalence and proportion of money recovered following most recent incident 84
Figure 25. Financial losses after recoveries for most recent incident 86
Figure 26. Median financial losses before recoveries for most recent incident among victims who lost any money, by whether respondent sought help,... 88
Figure 27. Median financial losses for most recent incident after recoveries, by small to medium business ownership status 89
Figure 28. Harms from cybercrime among victims 90
Figure 29. Harms from cybercrime among victims, by number of crime types reported 91
Figure 30. Harms from cybercrime among victims, by crime type 92
Figure 31. Harms to business from cybercrime among victims who owned, operated or managed a small to medium business 95
Boxes
Box 1. What is covered by this report? 20
Box 2. Challenges with measuring cybercrime 22
Box 3. Data breaches 33
Box 4. Ransomware 38
Box 5. Investment scams 43
Box 6. Estimating the extent of unreported cybercrime 69
Box 7. What influences help-seeking from police following a cybercrime incident? 73
Box 8. What factors influence whether cybercrimes are investigated or an offender is apprehended? 76
Box 9. Has victim satisfaction increased over time? 78
Box 10. Big financial losses or high volume, low yields? 87
Box 11. Why measure other harms from cybercrime? 90
Box 12. Cybercrime and its effects on small to medium business 97
Table A1. Roy Morgan Research Solutions Single Source panel quotas 107
Table A2. Invitation and completion rates, Roy Morgan Single Source panel (unadjusted) 108
Table A3. Respondents by usual place of residence (unweighted data) 109
Table A4. Respondents by usual place of residence (weighted data) 110
Table A5. Respondents by age 110
Table A6. Selected sociodemographic characteristics of respondents (weighted data) 112
Table A7. Lifetime prevalence of cybercrime victimisation (weighted and unweighted data) 112