( Is Hardsec the Future of Cybersecurity? ) Malicious cyber activity is big business - it costs the US economy more than $5 billion annually. According to the US Council of Economic Advisors, this figure is expected to exceed $6 trillion globally by 2021. In 2019, over 7.9 billion data breaches were reported, twice the number of cases seen in 2018. These worrying statistics make cybercrime more profitable than the global trade of all major illegal drugs combined. "The good guys are getting tired," said Charles Carmakal, a senior vice president at FireEye Inc., the Milpitas, California-based cybersecurity company. Despite the billions invested in securing our information, hacking remains a lucrative and attractive business. According to New York Times reporter Nicole Perlroth, hackers are able to make large sums by simply scouring systems looking for flaws in code that might allow backdoor entry to information. Once found, hackers are able to sell access to these bugs for six-figure sums.