Cybercrime - where in America are you most at risk?

Last updated on February 20, 2025

Over the last year, we have been spending more time than ever on the internet. Whether working remotely, shopping online, enjoying entertainment, or chatting with friends, the internet has been a lifeline for staying connected during the pandemic. However, as much as it has been a force for good, it has also proven opportunistic for cyber criminals, with more than $4.2 billion lost to cyber attacks in the last year.

Through analyzing the FBI Internet Crime Report for 2020*, it was revealed that more than 160,000 people have fallen victim to the crimes in the US. We decided to take a deep dive into the data and find out which states people were most likely to be attacked, which states people are likely to lose the most money, and which state is the overall worst for cyber crimes.

California is the worst overall state for crime with the highest overall cost and the most victims in total. While Vermont is the best state, with the lowest overall cyber crime rates.

The District of Columbia was revealed to be the area in the US where people are most likely to fall victim to attacks, with 170 victims per 100,000 people, while Iowa and Wisconsin are the two states with lowest rates of cyber crime – both states saw 23 victims per 100,000.

Missouri was found to be the state with the highest average cost of cyber crimes at $63,549 per victim, which is 16 times higher than Montana, with the lowest average cost – $3,762 per victim.

The states appear in ranking order. Rank was calculated by the “highest combination of victims and cost”. Firstly, each state was ordered by total cost and ranked. Secondly, each state was ordered by total victims and ranked. These ranks were combined to come up with an overall ranking.

Rank	State	Total cost per state ($)	Number of victims per state	Average cost per victim ($)	Average victims per 100,000 people
1	California	$621,452,320	26,379	$23,559	67
2	Florida	$295,032,829	19,364	$15,236	90
3	Texas	$313,565,225	12,914	$24,281	44
4	New York	$415,812,917	10,052	$41,366	50
5	Illinois	$150,496,678	4,780	$31,485	37
6	New Jersey	$98,727,053	10,616	$9,300	114
7	Ohio	$170,171,951	3,708	$45,893	31
8	Pennsylvania	$108,506,204	4,066	$26,686	31
9	Georgia	$98,762,523	4,321	$22,856	40
10	Virginia	$101,661,604	3,929	$25,875	46
11	Maryland	$62,473,193	7,279	$8,583	118
12	Washington	$88,020,254	3,807	$23,121	49
13	Colorado	$100,663,897	2,502	$40,233	43
14	Missouri	$115,913,584	1,824	$63,549	30
15	Arizona	$72,128,637	3,005	$24,003	42
16	Michigan	$83,999,442	2,793	$30,075	28
17	North Carolina	$69,409,152	2,940	$23,609	28
18	Massachusetts	$97,583,753	2,192	$44,518	31
19	Nevada	$44,383,452	3,707	$11,973	119
20	Tennessee	$40,191,616	2,480	$16,206	36
21	Minnesota	$58,341,798	1,699	$34,339	30
22	Indiana	$35,180,105	2,211	$15,911	33
23	Oregon	$38,389,702	1,543	$24,880	36
24	Utah	$47,113,946	1,251	$37,661	38
25	Alabama	$27,549,157	1,574	$17,503	31
26	Wisconsin	$36,081,681	1,342	$26,886	23
27	Oklahoma	$20,748,692	1,721	$12,056	43
28	Connecticut	$41,311,798	969	$42,633	27
29	Louisiana	$26,717,928	1,246	$21,443	27
30	South Carolina	$25,244,978	1,341	$18,825	26
31	Nebraska	$11,799,640	1,734	$6,805	88
32	District of Columbia	$18,942,722	1,174	$16,135	170
33	New Mexico	$23,903,594	890	$26,858	42
34	Kansas	$19,157,289	1,090	$17,575	37
35	Iowa	$21,396,701	721	$29,676	23
36	Kentucky	$12,590,784	1,146	$10,987	25
37	Mississippi	$18,111,738	824	$21,980	28
38	North Dakota	$25,804,940	425	$60,718	55
39	Montana	$5,669,293	1,507	$3,762	139
40	Arkansas	$17,371,515	784	$22,158	26
41	Hawaii	$13,671,531	490	$27,901	34
42	Delaware	$6,486,617	1,096	$5,918	111
43	Idaho	$11,670,650	448	$26,051	24
44	Maine	$7,073,260	691	$10,236	51
45	Rhode Island	$7,669,670	330	$23,241	30
46	Alaska	$7,342,743	292	$25,146	40
47	West Virginia	$4,823,786	449	$10,743	25
48	New Hampshire	$4,949,296	360	$13,748	26
49	Wyoming	$5,096,704	277	$18,400	48
50	South Dakota	$3,208,241	213	$15,062	24
51	Vermont	$4,175,799	172	$24,278	27

Top tips for staying safe online

Strong passwords
Use different passwords for different websites and accounts. When setting a password ensure to use a combination of number, letters and symbols, avoiding any personal information. It is also a good idea to change your passwords regularly.
Be cautious on social media
Check your privacy settings on your social media accounts, ensuring that they are private. Cybercriminals can scour through social media profiles to find sensitive information that could be used to reset passwords or pose as you online, this includes pet names, mother’s maiden name etc.
Always check hyperlinks
Hover over hyperlinks you are unsure of to see where they actually link to. If it doesn’t go where you are expecting, don’t click it. This is especially important in emails. If you get an email appearing to be from a company you have an account with, hover over the link to check it actually links to the company website.
Watch out for pop-ups
Cybercriminals can create fake pop-ups that appear on websites pretending to be genuine adverts. If in doubt, do not click on them and to get rid of them avoid clicking buttons that appear to say cancel, and look for an ‘x’ in the corner. You can also choose to block pop-ups on certain browsers.
Use a full service internet protection suite
Ensure you have a firewall set up on your computer to block external attacks, while an antivirus programme will constantly monitor against threats, reducing the chances of hackers or phishers gaining access to your network.
Ensure software is up to date
Ensure your operating system, programmes, apps, and antivirus protection is up to date. Hackers can find it easier to infiltrate when there is a known flaw which an update has patched up.
Use a VPN
A Virtual Private Network is easy to set up and there are now plenty of reputable VPNs that can be easily downloaded. A VPN encrypts all data leaving your device until it arrives at its destination.
Beware of offline tech support
If you receive an unexpected phone call claiming to be from a company or bank and they ask for any personal details, this is likely to be phishers posing as a credible source to extor the information.

Michal Wendrowski, Managing Director and founder of Rublon, said,

“We all spent a lot more time indoors and online last year, and unfortunately as you can see from the FBI report, criminals took full advantage of this situation – extorting more than $4.2 billion from US citizens through cyber-attacks. We decided to break this research down into states and analyze where cyber-attacks were most likely to occur, and in which states victims were losing the most money.

“Luckily, there are plenty of resources out there to educate and protect people against these crimes from happening and hopefully by highlighting where and who is most at risk, these numbers can decrease instead of increase by the end of 2021.”

* https://www.ic3.gov/Media/PDF/AnnualReport/2020_IC3Report.pdf