There will come a day when you get tagged by a hacker. But once you figure out how it happened and close the hole, should you call the cops?

Calling in the authorities is a hard decision to make because it could result in more pain—both business and personal. If you don't notify law enforcement and you're hacked again, you'll lose credibility with upper management. There can be business insurance ramifications for not filing a police report, and of course, lack of legal involvement means that the culprit will never get prosecuted in a criminal court.

On the other hand, many level-headed executives worry that investigators will freeze systems and possibly even seize mission-critical equipment. In complicated cases, they might have to.

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