Google paid $10 million to bug hunters in 2023, $2 million less than the previous year

The amount was distributed amongst 632 researchers in 68 countries

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Published onMarch 14, 2024

published onMarch 14, 2024

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Every year, Google has been rewarding the bug hunter community for identifying vulnerabilities and exploits in its products, primarily Chrome and Android. In Google’s 2023 Bug Bounty program, the amount stood at$10M, taking the total rewards since2010to$59M.

In theofficial blog post, Google highlights that359unique security bugs were reported in its native browser, Chrome, and$2.1Mwas paid out to the hunters. For Android, Google gave out$3.4Min bug bounty but didn’t disclose the number of vulnerabilities.

In the wearables domain (Nest, Fitbit and others), the tech giant paid $116,000. And forGenerativeAI, the total bounty was$87,000.

The highest reward for the year stood at$113,337,but there’s no official confirmation about who it went to. In the blog, Google thanked two researchers,Zinuo HanandYu-Cheng Lin, for their contribution to the bug-hunting program.

Bounty falls in comparison to 2022

Though the$10million bounty is a significant amount, it’s$2Mless than the$12MGoogle paid out the bug hunters in 2022. The Mountain View-based tech giant didn’t reveal a reason for the drop. However, it looks like fewer vulnerabilities were reported in2023.

Looking at the last decade, the bug bounty has increased yearly since2015, except for a tiny$0.1Mdrop in2017.

Another interesting fact is that, while in2022, the highest rewards stood at$605,000, it fell to$113,337in2023, an81.27%drop.

Other tech giants, too, offer such rewards. Interested bug hunters stand a chance towin $20,000 with Microsoft’s bounty programfor identifying vulnerabilities and exploits in its products.

What’s your take on Google’s bug bounty report for 2023? Share with our readers in the comments section.

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Google paid $10 million to bug hunters in 2023, $2 million less than the previous year

Bounty falls in comparison to 2022