Buried in the Ground: Finding the Cost of Cyber Economic Espionage

By: William Akoto and Trey Herr | Spring 2026

This paper addresses the complex challenge of measuring the costs of cyber economic espionage, emphasising the difficulty of quantifying direct financial losses and broader indirect impact ssuch as reputational harm, operational disruption, and strategic vulnerabilities. High-profile incidents, including the Equifax breach and the U.S. Office of Personnel Management hack, reveal both the tangible and intangible costs of cyber intrusions. Unlike traditional espionage, cyber operations allow for large-scale data extraction with minimal visibility, complicating efforts to assess and respond to their consequences. The study highlights the need for consistent methodologies to differentiate and quantify costs, some of which require forward-looking and counterfactual analysis. It also explores how these costs influence policy decisions on acceptable thresholds for harm and the delineation of ‘tolerable’ activities. By examining the broader costs of cyber economic espionage, this research underscores the urgency of refining cost measurement frameworks to guide both scholarly inquiry and policymaking. The findings contribute to advancing democratic accountability and shaping norms for cyber and economic espionage in a rapidly evolving technological landscape.

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