Google Handed Out 46.5 Crores In Rewards For Bug Bounty Programs

Earning tons of bucks every year, some tech giants are generously spending a slice of overall revenues on rewards for several bug bounty programs. For Google, the company has also launched its own Vulnerability Reward Programs for nearly a decade and last year's bug bounty program was revealed as another milestone in terms of prize money.

Google said in a recent announcement that it handed out a total of $6.5 million (appx. 46.5 crores) to the security researchers for detecting kinks in its defense systems. According to the company, this amount is around twice as the 2018’s figure for bug bounties paid by Google in 2018, which was said to be $3.4 million.

In the meantime, researchers donated $500,000 to charity, which was also an all-time highest amount of donation since the start of these programs in 2010. Also, the search giant reportedly paid out over $21 million in rewards. The 6.5-million-dollar package was divided into a few major categories, including Google products, Android and Chrome respectively accounting for $6.5, $1.9, and $1 million in bug bounties while researchers uncovering Google Play flaws took back $800,000.

There’s no coincidence when it comes to the sudden rise of Google’s bug bounties. The baseline of rewards has been tripled from $5,000 to $15,000 in the past year. In addition to this change, researchers also received as much as $30,000 for their “high-quality reports”. The company stated that experts who can spot and detail a fatal exploit under the form of full chain remote codes in the Android OS will have a chance to win a $1 million prize as well as a $500,000 bonus.