Stolen PayPal Accounts Have Skyrocketed In Value During The Pandemic
Image via Ink Drop / Shutterstock.com
If you haven’t enabled two-factor authentication on your PayPal account yet, buyers on the dark web are going to love you for it. It appears that hacked PayPal accounts have nearly tripled in value during the pandemic, while criminals have been paying lower prices to access credit cards.
This is according to researchers at cybersecurity product review site Comparitech, who have scoured 13 marketplaces on the dark web and found that buyers are spending 9.2 cents per dollar in a stolen PayPal account’s balance, up from 3.13 cents per dollar just eight months ago. That’s about 294% of how much PayPal accounts were worth back then.
On average, criminals are now forking out an average of US$196.50 per account or balance transfer on PayPal, while the average account balance is US$2,133.61.
The account type matters, too. For individual accounts, buyers are apparently spending an average of US$161.59 on them; Premier accounts cost US$186.31 on average; and business accounts are priced at an average of US$246.
These are far more significant than how much thieves are spilling on stolen credit cards—about US$17,36 per card, or US$0.0033 per dollar of credit limit. That’s 27% lower than the amount buyers paid eight months ago.
Cloned physical cards are actually more expensive, costing about US$171 on average, since they have to be manufactured and shipped.
At the same time, the price for a stolen credit card fell by 27%. Compared to pre-pandemic times, the cost of a stolen PayPal account rose by 297%.
No matter the value, remember to keep your accounts secure. You didn’t sign up to be a charity for the dark web.
[via TechRadar and IT PRO, cover image via Ink Drop / Shutterstock.com]
Also check out these recent news
