created by Synthesyndicate on 17/02/2025 at 17:12 UTC
171 upvotes, 14 top-level comments (showing 14)
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1 upvotes, 0 direct replies
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Comment by jeffcgroves at 17/02/2025 at 17:21 UTC
78 upvotes, 3 direct replies
A lot of their "money" is in stock value. In theory, you could hack the stock exchange and take their stock shares illegally and then sell them for money, but the exchange would probably notice. However, it's possible exchanges aren't as well protected as banks or the government (which issues Treasury bills), so you might have something
Comment by S_A_N_D_ at 17/02/2025 at 18:18 UTC
22 upvotes, 1 direct replies
A lot of people are pointing out that it's not necessarily as accessible or easy to hack them.
It's also very unlikely to get publicized. Most billionaires are very protective of their personal life, especially their personal finances. Any one of them that does get hacked is very unlikely to make that public, and anyone involved is going to be under so many layers of privacy agreements and NDA's that they couldn't talk. The few that aren't under NDA's still likely won't talk because they're likely in an industry where their reputation matters and pissing off your clientele is not going to be good for business.
Comment by Fauropitotto at 17/02/2025 at 18:14 UTC
32 upvotes, 0 direct replies
Billionaires have thousands of people that profit from managing them and their assets. That's thousands of people that have a vested interest in both not fucking up, and defending those assets from attackers.
Wealth management funds may take 2% a year. What's 2% of $5 *Billion*?
If you had a firm making *$100 Million* from a single client, how much money would you invest in security, technology, and assets to ensure that you keep that client?
From a security perspective, if you had $5B in assets, how much money would you spend a year to ensure you're completely insulated from the world at every possible aspect?
Comment by shitposts_over_9000 at 17/02/2025 at 18:01 UTC
7 upvotes, 0 direct replies
billionaires do far less of the kind of banking transactions most at risk for fraud
one person getting a bit of fraud isn't that newsworthy
targeted hacking for activist reasons was never that successful beyond media attention
Comment by ManufacturerSecret53 at 17/02/2025 at 19:09 UTC
6 upvotes, 0 direct replies
Because the assets aren't liquid.
It's stock, precious metals, art, real estate, etc...
Keeping money in that amount in cash would be a really bad decision just from inflationary pressure.
Comment by mrhymer at 17/02/2025 at 20:35 UTC
5 upvotes, 0 direct replies
Because their money is invested in a thousand places and protected by the Securities Exchange Commission, the Treasury Department, and the FBI just like your invested money is.
Comment by Anagoth9 at 18/02/2025 at 00:37 UTC
5 upvotes, 0 direct replies
No one gets their money stolen through hacking. That's just not really a thing. At most, scammers might obfuscate who they are by spoofing email addresses or creating fake login pages, things of that nature, but those are moreso tools for social engineering rather than exploiting system vulnerabilities. If someone was actually able to hack a bank or securities exchange then that in and of itself would be bigger news than whatever billionaire was robbed. If you had an exploit able to bypass those systems then you wouldn't *need* to rob anyone; the bounty on that exploit would be enough to set you up.
Comment by karkonthemighty at 17/02/2025 at 23:16 UTC
2 upvotes, 0 direct replies
Theoretically there could be plenty of money being embezzled from billionaires, when they have that much money and you're not sticking your hand too deep in the pot, would they even notice?
Comment by vander_blanc at 18/02/2025 at 04:12 UTC
1 upvotes, 0 direct replies
The typical millionaire isn’t getting phishing emails or txts. Simple as that. They have a WAY smaller target on their back. They didn’t sell themselves to get the thing for a discount or free. They’re not signing up for loyalty cards or the like.
On top of that - they aren’t directly accessing their finances. It’s through a professional or investment service. They aren’t logging in to an app and doing etransfers and paying bills.
Comment by Leverkaas2516 at 18/02/2025 at 09:24 UTC*
1 upvotes, 0 direct replies
Anyone with a net worth above a few million dollars will be paying an investment manager to manage their holdings. It's not like you can just guess some rich guy's password and drain hundreds of millions of dollars out of a bank account.
Comment by ComesInAnOldBox at 18/02/2025 at 12:02 UTC
1 upvotes, 0 direct replies
Because of *overwhelming* majority of billionaires worth isn't in cash, that's why. It's in the value of the companies and assets they own, not the least of which is in stock. They aren't walking around with billions in their bank account.
Comment by shellexyz at 18/02/2025 at 15:04 UTC
1 upvotes, 0 direct replies
While a billionaire is gonna have a checking account with a lot of zeros in the balance, the overwhelming majority of their wealth is not liquid cash. Elon Musk can’t write a check for $400B, it’s not how his wealth works.
There is a sense in which that’s not significantly different from a solid middle-class homeowner. Maybe a checking account has about $10k in it and another $30k in savings. That’s a small fraction of their net worth, and most of their “wealth” is in retirement accounts and their home. Altogether, maybe $1-1.5M and while I get that a ridiculously large portion of this country isn’t even close to that, it’s not exactly generational wealth.
Comment by luckygirl54 at 17/02/2025 at 18:27 UTC
1 upvotes, 0 direct replies
I was thinking about this, too. Where are the Robin Hood Hackers? Steal from the rich and give to the poor. There was a movie called Sneakers where they did that. I know life isn't a movie, but it would be a cool move to wake up and see Elon a couple of hundred thou down and planned parenthood up in their bank account a bit.