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>terrorism Isn't ransomware profit-motivated? I thought with terrorism the goal was fear rather than profit.
by Thorrez 6y ago
>terrorism
Isn't ransomware profit-motivated? I thought with terrorism the goal was fear rather than profit.
- Polylactic_acid 6y agoTerrorism is a buzzword that means "Person I don't like" now.
- the_only_law 6y agoI thought terrorism were those guys we're at war with?
- Cthulhu_ 6y agoNo, those have rights (geneva convention)
- markdown 6y ago> Brown person I don't like. FTFY
- kergonath 6y agoNo, those are fascists.
- bonestamp2 6y agoTo make matters even more complicated, even the anti-fascists (aka "antifa") have become the enemy too.
- szczesniewski 6y agoIIRC antifa from the start is a violent group. Use whatever means necessary to stop fascism. What means are necessary and what is fascism is left as an exercise for a reader.
- chrisweekly 6y agoIf only there were a word to describe the people who are anti-antifa.
- ars 6y agoThen two "anti"s cancel out, and you just call them "fa". Pronounced like the Yiddish word Feh.
- mwill 6y agoThere have been ransomware attacks that are covers for outright attacks, iirc some where the payment and decryption mechanism didn't even function. On a more theoretical level, it's certainly possible to do both at the same time, two birds with one stone. But it seems a lot of the big gangs are suspected state-sponsored, which is less terrorism and more cyber warfare
- donor20 6y agoAnd plenty just want to get paid - it's actually pretty impressive how many take down / don't share if they are paid or actually come through with the decryption keys. Hard to see how they are terrorists? What are they pushing to accomplish with their terror campaign. Anyways, my health care system constantly assures me security is its "top" priority and "state of the art".
- mwill 6y agoI'm not saying all ransom ware attacks are terrorists, just that ransomware attacks are not always profit-motivated, some are covers for larger attacks, some are just disruption operations, and either one of those can be considered terrorism, or cyber warfare. (I am not the user who originally said this was terrorism)
- toomanybeersies 6y agoNot saying that it's the case with most (or even any) ransomware, but it's very common for terrorist organisations/liberation movements/violent non-state actors fund their activities through organised crime. ETA used to rob banks, the Contras trafficked cocaine, the RIRA smuggles cigarettes and launders agricultural fuel, the remnants of the Islamic State have turned to illegal forestry, etc. etc.
- Thorrez 6y agoIf it's a fake ransomware then yeah that's probably terrorism. If it's fake it's obviously not done for profit. I'm referring to actual ransomware that works, that's done for profit. > On a more theoretical level, it's certainly possible to do both at the same time, two birds with one stone. I'm not sure how well that would work. Ransomware generally has responsive and helpful support people, because without that it will be hard to convince victims to pay. If they spend their time instilling fear instead of confidence in the payment process, then no one will pay.
- jazzyjackson 6y agoTerrorists need revenue
- Thorrez 6y agoSure, but the attacks done for revenue reasons would be classified as profit-motivated rather than terrorism. The attacks done for fear would be classified as terrorism. Ransomware attacks are known for having responsive and helpful support people, because they want a reputation for promptly decrypting the data when the payment is given.
- ebg13 6y agoWe can easily reconcile the two by recognizing that profit doesn't have to be money and that terrorists definitely profit from fear (otherwise they wouldn't do it). Everything we do is for profit, even if that profit isn't measured exclusively in dollars. We can further reconcile them by saying that the entire mechanism for extracting money from the ransom victim is by making them afraid. In this case, afraid of losing their computer systems.
- Thorrez 6y agoI'm not following. Are they asking for ransom or not? If yes, then they are getting actual monetary profit, we don't need to think about "profit [that] isn't measured exclusively in dollars". If no, then it's not ransomware. >We can further reconcile them by saying that the entire mechanism for extracting money from the ransom victim is by making them afraid. In this case, afraid of losing their computer systems. You might be partially right. But I see it more of them trying to convince you to take a deal. They're trying to sell you something: your data. They want you to have as little fear as possible that you can get your data back. They want you to be 100% confident in the payment process. Yes there's fear of what would happen if you don't pay. But that's a path they want you to avoid. You could almost categorize any negotiation this way. The person you're negotiating with will try to convince you how good it is to take the deal and how bad it is to not take the deal. The other difference between this and regular terrorism is that regular terrorism wants the general population to be scared. In ransomware, they have no goal at all of making the general population scared. In fact making the general population scared would be counterproductive, because it could lead to people patching their computers making future profits harder.
- deleted 6y ago[deleted]
- bawolff 6y agoUsually the goal is political change through fear. Fear doesn't really make sense as an end in and of itself
- kleiba 6y agoThe original meaning of the word "terrorism" has long lost its course since the early 2000s.
- bergstromm466 6y ago-
- sgift 6y ago> the unlawful use of violence and intimidation, especially against civilians, in the pursuit of political aims. From Oxford dictionary. Terrorism absolute includes the political struggle. The point is that terrorism uses violence and intimidation to further its goals and that it has no legal base for it.
- AlexandrB 6y agoAh, like the war in Iraq.
- Cthulhu_ 6y agoTerrorist, too; it's a cheap and easy way to apparently get around those pesky human rights. Only caveat is that you can't use it against white people because those are on our side. (sarcasm / irony / etc)
- throwaway0a5e 6y agoYou can use it against white people. You just have to dig though their social media until you find at least one of them saying something that can be construed as racist. Then the "domestic terrorist" label applies to the whole group.
- deleted 6y ago[deleted]
- maaaaattttt 6y agoThe fear of losing money is a real one. On the other hand, I believe that the word terrorism and the characterization of acts as terrorists should not be taken too lightly as it can lead to misuse of power rather quickly.
- Thorrez 6y agoFear of losing money if you pay the ransom or if you don't pay the ransom? They certainly don't want to make you fear paying the ransom, because that would mean you won't pay and they wouldn't profit. Fear of losing money if you don't pay the ransom: yes. But this could sort of apply to many salespeople, marketers, negotiators. They want to make it sound very good to take the deal and very bad (yes, maybe scary) to not take the deal. The way the fear is targeted between ransomware and terrorism is also quite different. Terrorism wants the general public to be scared. Ransomware doesn't want the general public to be scared, because that would lead to people patching their systems, reducing future profit opportunities.
- bonestamp2 6y agoI wouldn't want to use the word lightly either, but if Russia is trying to destabilize our economy, for their own political gain, and they inadvertently threaten or kill many people in the process (by shutting down hospital information systems)... that is the textbook definition of terrorism.
- red_admiral 6y agoWhen it's done by a nation-state, we used to call that "war".
- curryst 6y agoOh good, were all part of rogue terrorist nations then. Shall we talk about Vietnam or Korea? Or how about the use of "Strategic Bombing" in WWII, which was specifically designed to crumble cities by terrifying their citizens into leaving. That's not even to mention the use of nuclear weapons, which under this definition would probably make the US the worst terrorist organization in the world. Perhaps an even closer corollary would be our embargo of Cuba, which effectively cut them off from having viable trading routes. We did it to destabilize their economy, so they would get rid of Communism because we don't like Communists. How many people have died of starvation because we're artificially dampening their economy?
- clusterfish 6y agoSigh, I feel like we need new words for all the modern horrors.
- Siira 6y agoIt can be a source of revenue for terrorists though.
- wongarsu 6y agoThe goal of terrorism is always political. Fear is the tool used by terrorism to reach the goal. Fear is a defining feature, but just means to an end. As others have noted: while this instance is unlikely to be terrorism, this is a tool that is useful in terrorism and has been used as such in the past.
- Fnoord 6y agoCiting Wikipedia [1] > The use of violence or of the threat of violence in the pursuit of political, religious, ideological or social objectives One could argue these are all political. In the end, you can deduce anything to being political. Or this definition by Alex P. Schmid from 1988: > "Terrorism is an anxiety-inspiring method of repeated violent action, employed by (semi-)clandestine individual, group, or state actors, for idiosyncratic, criminal, or political reasons, whereby—in contrast to assassination—the direct targets of violence are not the main targets. The immediate human victims of violence are generally chosen randomly (targets of opportunity) or selectively (representative or symbolic targets) from a target population, and serve as message generators. Threat- and violence-based communication processes between terrorist (organization), (imperiled) victims, and main targets are used to manipulate the main target (audience(s), turning it into a target of terror, a target of demands, or a target of attention, depending on whether intimidation, coercion, or propaganda is primarily sought". Source and more scholar definitions see [2]. For in-depth criteria I can recommend Alex P. Schmid's "Revised Academic Consensus Definition of Terrorism" from 2011 [3] as it is what scholars at Leiden University use. Regarding the criterium is it always political, see #9: > 9. While showing similarities with methods employed by organized crime as well as those found in war crimes, terrorist violence is predominantly political – usually in its motivation but nearly always in its societal repercussions; (Its too large to quote all 12 criteria; again, please see [3] (no HTTPS)) Sometimes, the goal of ransomware is political, but its disguised as if goal is financial. This provides cover for e.g. a state actor. [1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Definition_of_terrorism https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Definition_of_terrorism [2] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Definition_of_terrorism#Scholars_and_recognized_experts_on_terrorism https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Definition_of_terrorism#Schola... [3] http://www.terrorismanalysts.com/pt/index.php/pot/article/view/schmid-terrorism-definition/html http://www.terrorismanalysts.com/pt/index.php/pot/article/vi...
- throwawaymanbot 6y agoyou can pretend you did it for the money... but just beacuse you get paid does not mean you are not terrorizing. What sort of logic are you using??