COMMENTARY: Cybercrime functions as an economic system, a marketplace for services, and a model for global collaboration. Modern cybercriminals have operationalized their networks to share infrastructure, sell access, recruit talent, transfer funds, and exploit gaps in visibility, trust, and jurisdiction.
The FBI recently released its cyber strategy, which offers a roadmap for defending the American people and the nation's critical infrastructure in cyberspace. The strategy details a four-pillar approach focused on the following: disrupting adversaries, supporting victims, strengthening partnerships, and building the capabilities this mission requires.
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It's become critical as cybercrime has emerged as one of the world’s most costly threats. The annual World Economic Forum 2026 Global Cybersecurity Outlook Report explores how accelerating AI adoption, geopolitical fragmentation, and widening cyber inequity have reshaped the global risk landscape.
No one organization can solve cybercrime alone: it requires continuous intelligence sharing, education, and a commitment to public-private cooperation.
How to disrupt cybercrime
Disrupting cybercrime requires a systematic approach. We recently partnered with Crime Stoppers International on the world’s first Cybercrime Bounty program, an innovative and unique approach which seeks intelligence about the people responsible for criminal operations.
Crime Stoppers International offers an anonymous channel for citizens and ethical hackers to submit information about cyberthreats, and our lab collects, assesses, verifies, and routes actionable intelligence about cybercriminals to law enforcement. Together, we connect people who may have information with experts who can evaluate it and authorities who can act on it.
The inaugural bounty, Operation Silent Vector I, targets the individuals behind the INC Ransomware-as-a-Service (RaaS) group. The group operates professionally with affiliates, primarily targeting North America and Europe across healthcare, manufacturing, government, and education. Since 2023, its operators and affiliates have used spearphishing along with double extortion—exfiltrating data before encryption and threatening to publicize information.
The Cybercrime Bounty program’s aims to generate actionable intelligence to help authorized law enforcement agencies identify, investigate, and ultimately hold these cybercriminals accountable.
We’ll need very strong public-private collaboration to fight cybercrime globally. Governments offer critical policy guidance, insights into national risks, and an understanding of systemic effects. Private cybersecurity experts bring operational skills, threat intelligence, technical expertise, and practical experience in protecting complex digital infrastructure.
A recent collaborative effort spearheaded by INTERPOL and supported by us through the World Economic Forum Cybercrime Atlas, Operation Red Card 2.0, resulted in the takedown of a cybercriminal network operating in Africa.
Between December 2025 and January 2026, law enforcement agencies from 16 African countries carried out Operation Red Card 2.0, targeting the infrastructure and operators behind online scams, mobile money fraud, and fraudulent loan applications. Investigators identified 1,247 victims and linked the criminal activity to losses exceeding $45 million. Leveraging information from its network of partners, authorities made 651 arrests, seized 2,341 devices, took down 1,442 malicious IP addresses, domains, and servers, and recovered more than $4.3 million.
Seventy-three percent of respondents in the World Economic Forum Global Cybersecurity Outlook 2026 Insight Report claimed that they or someone in their network had been personally affected by cyber fraud, further demonstrating the pervasiveness of this issue and the importance of neutralizing threats.
Armed with offensive AI tooling and techniques that help them work smarter, not harder, cybercriminals now attack at machine speed. Today’s cyber defenders are evolving cybersecurity operations into an industrialized defense and adopting AI tools that respond at the same velocity: 91% of respondents to our 2026 Cybersecurity Skills Gap Report reported using or experimenting with AI-powered cybersecurity tools.
For defenders protecting critical infrastructure and commercial enterprises, pairing human expertise with AI tools offers the machine-speed defense needed to combat increasingly sophisticated attacks. Eighty-four percent of respondents to our Cybersecurity Skills Gap Report confirmed that AI tools have made their security teams more effective.
Confronting cybercrime requires a global, coordinated effort with participation from the industry and government. For defenders in the trenches, AI’s value lies in augmenting human expertise, accelerating decision-making, and strengthening resilience. Forging strategic partnerships and deploying modern technologies can help us all protect against today’s cybercriminals and prepare for tomorrow’s threats.
Derek Manky, chief security strategist, Global VP of Threat Intelligence, Fortinet
SC Media Perspectives columns are written by a trusted community of SC Media cybersecurity subject matter experts. Each contribution has a goal of bringing a unique voice to important cybersecurity topics. Content strives to be of the highest quality, objective and non-commercial.
